Fire Salamander (Pyrenees' Biodiversity)

Fire Salamander

Salamandra salamandra

Summary ⁶

The fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra) is possibly the best-known salamander species in Europe. It is black with yellow spots or stripes to a varying degree; some specimens can be nearly completely black while on others the yellow is dominant. Shades of red and orange may sometimes appear, either replacing or mixing with the yellow according to subspecies. Fire salamanders can have a very long lifespan; one specimen lived for more than 50 years in Museum Koenig,...

Range description ⁷

This species is present across much of central, eastern and southern Europe. In the former Soviet Union, it is known only from the mountains and foothills of the Ukrainian Carpathians. The populations of this species in Iberia are very fragmented (there is a small Area of Occupancy within the wider Extent of Occurrence). The populations of Salamandra species reported from western Anatolia, Turkey, require further investigation into the species involved and are not evaluated in this account. It occurs from lowland areas up to 2,500m asl (in central Spain).