Fire Belly Newt

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Fire Belly Newts

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Amphibia
Order:	Caudata
Family:	Salamandridae
Genus:	Cynops Tschudi, 1838

The Fire Belly Newts (Cynops), or Fire Newts, are a genus of newts native to Japan and China. All of the species show bright yellow or red bellies, however this feature is not unique to this genus.

1 Species
2 Fire Bellied Newts as pets
3 Taxonomic controversy
4 Aquarium Proportions
5 Environment
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Species

Chenggong Fire Belly Newt (Cynops chenggongensis )
Blue-Tailed Fire Belly Newt (Cynops cyanurus)
Japanese Sword-Tailed Newt (Cynops ensicauda)
Chinese Fire Belly Newt (Cynops orientalis)
Dayang Fire Belly newt (Cynops orphicus)
Japanese Fire Belly Newt (Cynops pyrrhogaster)
Wolterstorff's Newt (Cynops wolterstorffi)

[edit] Fire Bellied Newts as pets

Fire Bellied Newts are sometimes sold at pet stores. They do best in a room-temperature freshwater aquariums with a small area of land or wood for them to surface on. Contrary to the way in which they're often sold at pet stores, Fire Bellied Newts do not require terrariums, and actually thrive in mistly aquatic environments. Fire Bellied Newts can be fed blood worms, brine shrimp, or chopped-up earthworms.In order to prevent potentially fatal toxins from getting into the water, do not feed the newts more than once a day. Some newts can go two -three days without food. Or, you can go to your local pet store and purchase mystery snails. They are quite inexpensive and will eat any excess food that the newts didn't. They also do well in groups of several Newts and aren't aggressive to other fish.

[edit] Taxonomic controversy

It has been suggested that the genus cynops is due for a split, the Chinese species being placed in a separate genus from the Japanese ones.^[1] The species Cynops cyanurus is at the centre of all this. There is much debate about the validity of Cynops cyanurus and Cynops chenggongensis. All the known captive animals could be something different from cyanurus as they do not entirely match the original description of the species.^{[citation needed]} The only known animals that match that are animals originating from Chemnitz Zoo but the problem is that they have not been able to get the F2 animals to breed well, which could suggest that they are in fact a hybrid of cyanurus and chenggongensis or an undescribed Cynops species. There have even been suggestions that the animals thought to be cyanurus in collections is in fact chennggongensis.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Aquarium Proportions

Both Japanese and Chinese Fire Belly Newts tend to require 3/4 land, and 1/4 water. This set-up is known as a vivarium, a mixture of land and water, so the newt(s) can 'bask on the banks' This can be achieved by using plexiglass, piled up gfavel, or even ceramic media. The vivarium should include caves or other places for the newts to hide when they are frightened. This helps to relieve stress or even death.

[edit] Environment

Fire belly newts are semi-tropical, meaning that they live in partly tropical areas. Therefore, they tend to like temperatures around 20 degrees Celsius to about twenty five degrees Celsius. A small aquarium heater does the job quite nicely. Newts also like misty conditions. This means that there should be some access heat to evaporate some water.

[edit] References

^ Chan, Zamudio and Wake: Relationships of the Salamandrid Genera Paramesotriton, Pachytriton, Cynops Based on Mitochondrial DNA Sequences. Copeia, 2001(4), pp. 997[1]