Topic: Baby Newts!

[gardenqueen]

Whilst clearing out some of the blanket weed, which was beginning to take over my wildlife pond, I came across some baby newts (not sure of the correct term for these!). I now have 2 adults and at least 6 babies!  ;D

Anyone know what good they do in the garden?

[Roy Bham UK]

Hi Gardenqueen, ;) I fell upon this very intersting and comprehensive site covering Birmingham & the Black Country not only about the Newt species but anything from canals to garden ponds, birds, wild plants ect. maybe I should pin this on the Wildlife forum. ???
I keep a fish pond so I can't really encourage anphibians as they don't get on. :o

Hope this helps and hope the link works. ::)

http://www.wildlifetrust.org.uk/urbanwt/ecorecord/bap/html/gcnewt.htm


Roy

[gardenqueen]

Thank you Roy,

Yes. the link worked!  ;) What an interesting site!
Having been on the Birmingham Canals, that part of the site is very interesting to OH.

I too, have a fish pond, but as yet have never found newts in there! Mind you the fish are bigger than the newts!  ;D

Thanks again for the information.

Annette

[Margaret]

Hi Annette. How about "newtlets" ?

Me and hubby have a bit of a joke going,ie baby ducks   ducklets.  Baby moorhens       moorlets.  baby swans    swanlets.
 
You can apply this to almost anything.After a while you start believing it too.

You wait till they really get going breeding.In my first year i had three newts.In 4 years ,when we cleared out the pond to make it bigger i stopped counting at 60.

[Margaret]

Oh yes,sorry,they eat tiny slugs,and other small insects of all types.

[gardenqueen]

Hello Margaret,

I just looked at my cat and thought catlet!  ;D

Don't mind if the newts eat small snails, but wonder if they would eat tadpoles? I had masses of spawn and resulting tadpoles, but can't say I have seen masses of frogs!

Oh well, it's a case of letting nature takes it's course, I suppose?  :(

Annette

[Doris_Pinks]

Saw one chomping on a bit of fish food the other day! :D They are welcome to as many as my slugs as they care to eat!! ;) Funny, when the children were smaller we called them the kidlets!

[Margaret]

Yes Annette,in the water, newts will eat anything that moves,so tadpoles(tadlets!) will be a tasty snack!! My aunt this year has got a good number of tadpoles to a decent size in a tank before putting them back in the pond.Me,i have not seen a tadpole in years since the newts arrived!!

[gardenqueen]

Hello Margaret,

No wonder the newtlets are surviving then! I doubt if I too, will see tadpoles (tadlets!) in future.

Annette

[gilgamesh]

Newts begin as spawn - and the youngsters are usually known by the old form of the name (a newt used to be an eft). I suspect that, like the tadpoles, they do eat tadpoles. Only a proportion of frog & toad tadpoles can grow to maturity. They are almost always the ones which become carnivorous, and they feed principally on those which remain as algae eaters. algae isn't terribly good food, and the veggie ones grow more slowly, and provide high-protein food for the predatory polliwogs.

[gardenqueen]

Thank you so much for the information. I have certainly learnt a lot about newts since discovering them.