Giant Chinese salamander is at least five distinct species, all heading toward extinction

With individuals weighing in at more than 140 pounds, the critically endangered Chinese giant salamander is well known as the world’s largest amphibian. But researchers reporting in the journal Current Biology on May 21 now find that those giant salamanders aren’t one species, but five, and possibly as many as eight. The bad news as highlighted by another report appearing in the same issue is that all of the salamanders—once thought to occur widely across China—now face the imminent threat of extinction in the wild, due in no small part to demand for the amphibians as luxury food.