Tiny Salamander Species Discovered, Declared Critically Endangered

After decades of field work and laboratory analyses, an international team of researchers announced the discovery of three new salamander species from the mountain forests of Oaxaca, Mexico. The new species belong to the genus Thorius, the minute salamanders, so named because the adults are smaller than a matchstick.Although once extremely abundant, all known populations of minute salamanders have declined precipitously over the last three decades, and living specimens are now difficult to find in the wild.Read the whole story on National Geographic's Weird & Wild news blog: 3 Tiny Salamander Species Found, Each Smaller Than a Coin.