Location: Torrance, CA. Toad arrived in a bag of wood chips.
Some of you have asked about this picture. THe Salamanders are in the creek that runs about ten feet in front of my home. Having the four sons I do they often go into the creek looking for Salamanders in and under the rocks. They like to see the variance in morphology and other interesting things. When they have a bunch like this they call me and ask for a picture as I took here. They then let them all go back into the rock where they found them until the next time they are bored enough to get into the creek. SO this is not a natural aggregation as found in the picture but more a picture of all the salamanders caught in a ten-foot-long part of the creek in about an hour.
Not sure what type of salamander this is. It looks like a small, skinny, pacific giant salamander...