Talk:Newt

clarity

The article's syntax makes it unclear which species of newt is the largest; is it Plurodeles or Calotriton? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.253.168.230 (talk) 19:59, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Having looked it up it's plurodeles. So I've changed the wording, hopefully making it clearer, and added a reference Richerman (talk) 23:19, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Ken Livingstone

The mayor of London. He keeps and breeds newts. It even says so in the article on him. Could he be mentioned in the popular culture section? I'll add it myself if nobody objects, but only after my finals, if I remember...

I think it's a good idea. Then we may have one popular culture item that isn't a fiction novel or a tv show. Cynops 13:40, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I've done that now and referenced it Richerman (talk) 00:28, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

i think newts should be kept as pets or in the wild.i know of people who were extremly cruel to their newts so as a result of this i this i think newts should only be allowed to be kept by responsible owners. i have a few newts myself and care for them extremly well.

Newts in popular culture

I don't think the last item on this - "In the interactive fiction game Enchanter by Infocom, there is a spell called "Cleesh" which transforms certain objects into newts. This is also the spell most likely cast at the beginning of Spellbreaker, which is the third game in the Enchanter trilogy." - belongs on a wikipedia page. -Cynops 01:07, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Tadpole with legs?

The second picture really looks like a tadpole with legs. How can you differentiate between these two? Lightblade 23:15, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Tylotriton

Tylotriton is not a European species of Newt. In fact, it does not exist. TyloTOtriton does exist, but

Development

There's a sentence in this section that says ......but most species are more picky (see picture on right) but I can't see what the picture has to do with some newts being "picky". Has the picture been changed? Richerman (talk) 00:32, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism

I am considering making a request for this article to be semi protected as most of the edits made over the last few months seem to be vandalism. Does anyone else have a view on this? Richerman (talk) 22:56, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Many articles are vandalized occasionally. Without diffs, this doesn't seem to be specific, repeated, purposeful attacks on the article. ThuranX (talk) 23:05, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

It will be declined post likely - as pointed out above, there needs to be consistent heavy vandalism from multiple new accounts and IPs with a long history (the page, not the IPs). Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 02:09, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Ah well, I suppose we'll just have to keep reverting it then - it does get rather tedious though. Richerman (talk) 10:36, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Peruvian Newt

I am surprised to not see the amphibian Lesser Spotted Peruvian Newt of the subclass Lissamphibia mentioned on this page.Indubitabler (talk) 22:52, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

No, and we don't have the one-eyed, two-toed, flying purple people-eater either. That's probably because we weren't born yesterday! Richerman (talk) 23:50, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Popular Culture

Monty Python and the Holy Grail's "She turned my into a newt!" should probably be in here. As useless and annoying as trivia can be, this is my one contribution. 72.161.250.152 (talk) 01:33, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

So... your one contribution is "useless and annoying as trivia can be"? No thanks. Please read WP:AVTRIV. ThuranX (talk) 02:18, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

This was included at one time with a lot of other trivia but it was all removed as the list was getting longer and sillier and didn't serve any useful purpose. Richerman (talk) 16:39, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't contradict the fact that this is probably one of the best-known cultural references to the newt. The average nerd should be able to quote this scene. As far as I'm considered, I used this quote well before I knew what a newt was. I think it is much better than the other cultural references. Sjoerdboersma (talk) 23:34, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

In the Monty Python film it was a mildly amusing one liner - in an article about newts it would serve what purpose exactly? And how would you weave this fascinating piece of information into the article?

In the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail John Cleese says 'she turned me into a newt ...well I got better'

When written down it's not funny and it adds nothing to the sum total of human knowledge about newts. Do you think a professionally written encyclopaedia would include it? As far as I'm concerned most of the Cultural references section needs to be deleted and the one or two items that are worth keeping should be woven ito the text as it says in WP:AVTRIV. Richerman (talk) 00:56, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Triturus/Lissotriton for Smooth Newt etc.

It would be good if we could be consistent in our use of the genus name Triturus i.e. does it refer only to the Crested/Marbled newts, or does it also include the species that have been segregated into the genera Lissotriton, Mesotriton and Ommatotriton? The latter view is supported by the phylogenetic data (see Steinfartz et al., 2007 - ref in main article), and is also the sense used in the Wikipedia Triturus article itself. The AmphibiaWeb database also favours the division of Triturus.

Until there is a consensus on this point, please would editors refrain from continually reverting edits designed to make articles internally consistent, rather than using two different names to refer to the same species within the same article. --Graminophile (talk) 16:36, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Not my job to convince you to stop, but yours to validate need for change, per BRD. If you can get the Smooth Newt page in order, then you can change it here. Sort it there, bring it here. ThuranX (talk) 00:30, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I will revise all the relevant newt articles for consistent with the modern nomenclature. --Graminophile (talk) 07:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I support the change. This nomenclature change has been supported by all subsequent studies; see Weisrock et al, 2006 [1]; and Zhang et al (2008) [2] GoEThe (talk) 13:13, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I have updated Carpathian Newt. GoEThe (talk) 13:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Long as everything's internally consistent. ThuranX (talk) 15:31, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Gallery

I think the article could do with a few pictures in a gallery to show different types of newts around the world. Govvy (talk) 13:14, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

The article is supposed to be an overview of newts. Galleries are not considered good practice and if one was added it would keep growing as everyone would have their own ideas about which pictures should go in. There are lots of links to specific articles and they all have their own images. Richerman (talk) 00:08, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

species not identified

The page says "species not identified" for the third picture, but the picture description says otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.66.224.99 (talk) 19:44, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm confused as to what you're trying to say. The only place it says "species not identified" is in the picture description. That's because we know it's a newt but we don't know which species of newt. Richerman (talk) 09:07, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the anonymous user means that while the legend says it is unidentified, the file description in File:Smooth Newt larva (aka).jpg clearly says it is an Alpine newt (even though the file is named Smooth newt...). GoEThe (talk) 14:41, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Frog-like body ?

It says newts have a "frog like body". In what way is it like a frog ? I thought the whole point of newts is that they look like lizards, not frogs.

Frogs have short round bodies with no tail and no neck and big size and orientation difference between front and back legs. Newts have elongated bodies with long tails and similar front and back legs.

Is the claim that newts have a "frog like body" some sort of commentary about internal organs ?Eregli bob (talk) 00:41, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I changed that weird piece of text.Thompsma (talk) 17:56, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

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Local Names

I was surprised that I didn't see the local names esker, eskert, asker and askert.

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Suggested Pruning of the Etymology Section

According to this talk section, the "newt" article falls under the Biology/Science and Reptiles and Amphibians categories. We currently have three full paragraphs devoted to etymology that has nothing to do with the scientific classification of these animals. The second two paragraphs deal with the origin of the names for newts in languages that are not English. These names are not used as common names in English, nor as scientific names and thus seem largely unnecessary to include.

I understand the value of the first paragraph, as "eft" and "newt" are both English terms in common use today. But I maintain devoting two full paragraphs to what newts are/were called in German, ancient Scottish, and Romance languages does not further the primary objective of a biology/reptile and amphibian article, which is presumably to educate the public about newts. To take this the logical extreme, we could take an article about any given animal and add in a massive list about the names for it in other languages, but that information would have limited use to a layperson trying to get basic biological information from a Wikipedia article, and would likely hinder their ability to do so. This is the only family level biology article I have seen that delves into this much detail about etymology that does not pertain to a common name, scientific name, or taxonomical classification.

I previously attempted to edit this information but it was added back in by another editor who wanted a discussion about it before removal. Unless there are any strong objections I intend to remove the second two paragraphs, as I believe they are outside the reasonable scope of this article.

Best,

Connorlong90 (talk) 03:25, 21 February 2018 (UTC)

• Agreed This is the English wikipedia so there is no reason to add all these common names from other languages. There are links to the article in other languages on the left of the page. Richerman (talk) 14:40, 21 February 2018 (UTC)

Anatomy and physiology

I added this section for content that was way out of scope for the Italian crested newt article, see discussion there. It may still need to be cut down; much of it may apply to salamanders or amphibians in general, or may simply be too detailed for an encyclopedic article. Tylototriton (talk) 10:22, 18 April 2020 (UTC)