Family: Plethodontidae, Lungless Salamanders view all from this family

Description 4 1/2-8 1/8" (11.4-20.6 cm). Usually shiny black with large white, gray, or yellow spots on sides and scattered smaller silvery white spots and/or brassy flecks atop head, back, and tail. Throat dark. Belly slate colored. Costal grooves, 16.

Breeding Courts and mates spring and fall in north, summer in south. Lays clutch of 6-36 eggs in underground retreat or in rotting log, late spring in north, August-September in south. Female guards nest. No aquatic larval stage. Larvae hatch late summer in north, October in south; mature in 3 years. Northern females lay every other year, southern females every year.

Habitat Shaded ravine slopes, shale banks, wooded floodplains, cave entrances; near sea level to 5,500' (1,676 m).

Range C. and w. New York south to West Virginia, e. Tennessee, c. Georgia and e. Alabama; west to Illinois and w. Kentucky; isolated population in s. New Hampshire.

Discussion Nocturnal. Active all year in the south. In the north, appears at the surface in early spring and, except during summer dry spells, can be found under flat rocks and rotten logs until the onset of sub-freezing temperatures in fall. After showers, the Slimy moves about the forest floor in search of invertebrate prey. Slimy's skin glands secrete a gluey substance that is next to impossible to remove from the fingers - thus the species name glutinosis. The Slimy Salamander "complex" has been split into 13 separate species; these are nearly indistinguishable from one another in the field, best identified by geography.