Our Pacific Northwest: Newts Renew Their Love in Berkeley

Our Pacific Northwest

Newts Renew Their Love in Berkeley

 

There is plenty of love in the air this Valentine’s Day, and homo sapiens aren’t the only ones feeling it. The Oakland Tribune has reported this week the newts of UC Berkeley’s Botanical Garden have returned, keeping their prompt annual schedule for mating season. According to the report, these newts return to the pools on the Berkeley campus yearly to reproduce in the same pools they were conceived in. The Botanical Garden’s website states the pools are home to two different species of newt, the Taricha torosa (California newt) and the Taricha granulosa (rough-skin newt). In a report filed by the Contra Costa Times, the newts were first spotted in 1964 by a zoology undergrad and have been an attraction to students, professors, and amphibian enthusiasts ever since. Empirical wishes you and your special newt a happy Valentine’s Day . If you don’t have one keep your head up and keep swimming, they may be only be just a pond away.