2. Embedded videos embedded thusly:
Will continue playing in the background and use a lot less bandwidth due to the smaller size.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xDqHM3LGv ... p=iAQB8AUB
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/axolotls ... ow-up.html
What is an axolotl?
The axolotl, Ambystoma mexicanum, is a type of salamander that doesn't go through metamorphosis.
Salamanders are amphibians that, like frogs and newts, start off living in the water.
Salamanders usually go through a process called metamorphosis to become adults - like a tadpole transforming into a frog. They will then mostly live on land. During metamorphosis they change in a number of ways to adapt to their new habitat. For example, they replace their water-breathing gills for air-breathing lungs and grow lids for their eyes.
Axolotls never make this transition. Instead, they keep their frilly external gills and other juvenile features and stay living in the water for their entire lifecycle.
This is called neoteny, or paedomorphism. Although axolotls look like the 'tadpole' form of most salamanders, they do become adults in the sense that they are able to breed. They also do go some way to developing lungs, but they are also able to breathe through their skin.
Axolotls' closest relatives are tiger salamanders, Ambystoma tigrinum. As a group, Ambystoma salamanders are known as mole salamanders for the land-dwelling adults' habit of living underground.
