Creepy Crawlies
Decided to do some work with the plants on our back porch so I picked up our grill cover which had been sadly not performing its job all winter but was instead lying on the deck. Upon reinstating the grill cover to its rightful position, I spied this little beauty. I’m pretty sure he (or she) is an Arboreal Salamander (Aneides lugubris), though I’m no vertebrate taxonomist. Here you can see him with a couple of slugs who were also making their home in the dark, cool crevasses of the tarp.
I did a little more research and decided I don’t think he’s so cute anymore, and here’s why:
Crap, now I might have nightmares about salamanders invading the house from the porch.
Great googly moogly! That’s horrendous.
Awe, he’s adorable. My cat has big, pointy teeth too and he just uses them to gnaw on Nate.
That’s one of the things I miss most about my childhood California adventures. My father put himself through college by collecting venomous critters and so all of our trips into the wilderness involved harassing lots of snakes, lizards, centipedes, salamanders, and other oddities. Despite lots of early exposure and knowing what is mostly likely to be dangerous, I still squeal upon spotting the little critters.
That’s almost exactly what I said when I saw the last pic online, except I threw in a few expletives.
DeAnna, your kitty is domesticated, salamanders, not so much. I don’t feel too scared though because he was definitely more afraid of me then I was of him!
If he uses those teeth to gnaw on bugs that might otherwise invade the house, I’d say welcome! Only problem I’d have would be being startled if he dashed in front of me. Then I’d scream like a girl.