Mating newts

The courtship and mating rituals of the male newts has been a treat to watch recently.

We finally succeeded in getting film of the newt courtship & mating

• We failed to record this in 2016 & 2017 & then we moved Nursery location. Finally, we have succeeded in building our population of newts again.
• The mating newt male wags his orange tummy in her direction and swishes his tail with its bright silver/grey stripe to attract her attention.
• He tries and tries! The video clip below is a small exert of the routine which continued for about 4 minutes.
• Eventually, she starts to get interested and you see her emerge from her hiding place.
• He never stays still as he encourages her to follow him.
• Then in the 2nd video he slides underneath her & she clasps his back with her hind legs.
• As he swims forward away from her I guess he releases his sperm so that it is in the water beneath her and she wriggles to attach it to her underbelly.
• Then she swims away alone and will later lay her fertilised eggs.
• From courtship to clasping was 8 minutes in real time.
• We are trying again so hopefully may get clearer footage.

We did get the following photos of a female newt as she laid her eggs in 2016:

• She swam around for ages choosing the right leaf
• Then she started to fold the leaf with her back feet.
• She lodged her hips into the fold to lay the egg.
• Then folded the leaf together over the egg she had laid.
• All still using her back legs.
• She 'glued' the fold together by releasing a sticky secretion.
• As she swam away she left the leaf folded over her egg to keep it protected from predators.
• We hope to get video footage of this activity this year. Watch this blog!
• If anyone films this themselves please send it to us for everyone to enjoy.

• The amazing thing - she will repeat this a hundred times a season.
• Afterwards, a rafting plant can have almost all its leaves bent over showing us where she, and other females, have been working.

The relationship between the wildlife and the plants:

You can see how the plants are vital to the female newt so she can lay her eggs -

• Without rafting plants like Myosotis scorpioides, Mentha aquatica, Veronica beccabunga or Rorippa nasturtium aquaticum  for the female newts to manipulate with their back feet they would not easily lay their eggs in your pond.
• Or it could be the white flowering Myosotis scorpioides Alba - the leaf is the same as far as the newts are concerned!
• Or other Non British Native plants like Oenanthe javanica Flamingo or Myriophyllum Red Stem

See our new Pond planting collection for Newts - A selection of 3 rafting plants all potted in 9cm baskets of aquatic soil

And we saw her hiding under Aponogeton distachyos plant growth and in blanketweed when she was ignoring her male newt in the video above.

We have a page in our Tips and Advice section devoted to the lifecycle of a newt - you may enjoy reading more about mating newts and seeing the longer version of the newt mating video & larger views of the photos of the egg laying.

Anyone who manages to video their mating newts or the females laying eggs - we would love to see. Please Share!