Yesterday in one of my murkier aquariums I discovered something that did not belong:
It appears to be a tiny adult red-spotted newt. There are a few plants in that tank that were floating in an outdoor pond (in North Carolina, I believe) a few months ago, so my guess is that an egg rode in on a leaf, hatched, and the tadpole spent the summer eating baby shrimp and hiding.
The problem with this explanation is that these guys are supposed to spend a few years living on land in between egg and adult. So…that’s a mystery.
