Male T. dobrogicus. Picture by Michael Fahrbach.

The taxonomical history of Triturus has been (and is) a turbulent one. However, genetic data has been very helpful in clearing it up. After our recent taxonomical revision of the genus, all species in the genus were considered monotypic except for one: in the Danube crested newt (T. dobrogicus) two subspecies were still recognized. But was this justified? No strong evidence was published in favour and recent work in fact seemed to disagree with this treatment. To settle the matter once and for all we turned to the power of the Triturus Ion Torrent protocol. After testing for the presence of intraspecific genetic structuring we could only conclude that there was none, or at least none that would fit the two subspecies hypothesis. Hence, in a recent paper in Amphibia-Reptilia, we suggest to treat the Danube crested newt as monotypic as well. Nice and tidy.

Reference: Wielstra, B., Vörös, J., Arntzen, J.W. (2016). Is the Danube crested newt Triturus dobrogicus polytypic? A review and new nuclear DNA data. Amphibia-Reptilia 37(2): 167-177.

I conducted this work as a Newton International Fellow.