Amphibia · Caudata
Cryptobranchus alleganiensisSonnini de Manoncourt & Latreille, 1801
Hellbender
Photograph by Dominic, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A nocturnal salamander reaching 737 mm nose to tail.
Amphibia › Caudata › Cryptobranchidae › Cryptobranchus
- Grows to
- 736.6mm
- greatest recorded
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Lives up to
- 30years
- Lives
- Aquatic, fossorial
What is known
24 sourced facts, each taken from a named scientific dataset. How to read these.
Cited from a dataset unless a row is marked otherwise.
Standing in the world
- Conservation status
- Vulnerable
- Population trend
- Decreasing
as reported by the IUCN Red List
The animal itself
- Longest recorded life
- 30years
Size
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 736.6mm2 ft 5 in
- Body mass · greatestmeasured
- 365g12.9 oz
- Body mass · a typical adult
- 358.1g12.6 oz
total length, tail included — this source reports total length for Caudata and Gymnophiona
maximum adult body mass as recorded in the source
AnAge rates this record "acceptable"
How it lives
- Eats arthropods
- Yes
- Eats vertebrates
- Yes
- Eats plant matter
- Unknown
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Where it lives
- Aquatic, fossorial
a blank flag in this source means unrecorded, not absent
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- How the young develop
- Through a larval stage
- Gestation or incubation
- 72days
- Average clutch
- 450
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 200–450eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 1per year
- Hatchling length
- 6mm
- Age at first breeding · female
- 1825days
- Mature at
- 3–6years
- Size at maturity
- 330mm
an average — Browne, Li, Wang, Okada, Hime, McMillan, Wu, Diaz, McGinnity, and Briggler, 2014, Amphib. Reptil. Conserv., 5:30-50
Naming and history
- Described by
- Sonnini de Manoncourt & Latreille
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1801
Keeping one
Hellbender is assessed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. Species at risk in the wild are often covered by CITES and by national law, which decide what may be bought, sold, moved across a border or kept at all — and captive-bred and wild-caught animals are usually treated differently. Check the rules where you are before acquiring one. Nothing below is a judgement about keeping this species; it is what a published welfare standard says about space, and what the animal itself was measured doing.
Swiss law requires a permit under Article 89 to keep this animal privately. Rules differ by country — check what applies where you are before acquiring one.
- Water, at least 37 cm deep
- 221 × 147cm
Minimum, and for two animals — which is how the standard states it. Bigger is always better.
This animal lives in water, so the standard gives 3 × 2 body lengths of water and no land area, for two animals.
For each further animal, another 221 × 147 cm of water.
Swiss Tierschutzverordnung (TSchV), SR 455.1, Anhang 2, Tabelle 6 — legally binding minimum enclosure sizes for amphibians, given as multiples of total body length and stated for two animals.
From this animal’s own total length of 2 ft 5 in (736.6 mm) — how this is worked out.
Hellbender
Feeding
37kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 365 g, the heaviest recorded for Hellbender — so it is the top of the range, not a figure for a particular animal. Weigh yours and the number will be lower.
An upper estimate, not a feeding target, and not veterinary advice. The equation covers only what an animal burns staying alive, so a growing, gravid or recovering animal needs more — and it was measured on wild animals, which move far more than one in an enclosure. Body condition and a vet who knows the species are what a feeding decision should rest on. Where this comes from.
What nobody knows
These are not gaps in our research. No scientific dataset records them for this species — and saying so is information you cannot get from a reference that simply leaves a field out.
- — Still living
- — Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- — Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult male mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult mean
- — Female length · mean, nose to tail
- — Length nose to tail · adult male mean
- — Length nose to tail · adult mean
- — Largest female · snout to vent
- — Largest male · snout to vent
- — Largest female · shell length
- — Largest male · shell length
- — Hatchling length · snout to vent
- — Hatchling length · nose to tail
- — Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · shell length
- — Egg length
- — Egg width
- — Body mass · adult female, mean
- — Body mass at hatching
- — Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradient
- — Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- — Diet
- — How it hunts
- — Mean clutch · smallest reported
- — Mean clutch · largest reported
- — Clutches a year · fewest
- — Clutches a year · most
- — First breeds from · youngest recorded
- — First breeds by · oldest recorded
- — Venomous
- — Fangs
- — Body temp in the wild · lowest mean recorded
- — Body temp in the wild · highest mean recorded
- — Limbs
- — Colour on the back
- — Pattern on the back
- — Pupil
- — Sex decided by
- — Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
- — Red List criteria
- — Region
- — Biome
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Suborder
- — Infraorder
- — Subspecies
- — Type locality
- — Habitat
- — Active in
- — Mainland or island
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
- — Highest it lives · above sea level
- — Range size
Others in Cryptobranchidae
Take this data
Everything on this page is available as data under CC BY 4.0 — use it freely, credit it, no permission needed.
This species as JSON · the whole dataset
Cite this page
The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia (2026). Cryptobranchus alleganiensis. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/cryptobranchus-alleganiensis
@misc{cryptobranchus_alleganiensis_2026,
title = {Cryptobranchus alleganiensis},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/cryptobranchus-alleganiensis}
}Sources
- Moura, M. R. et al. TetrapodTraits: a database of 33,281 tetrapod species. Used under CC BY 4.0. Observed values only; this encyclopedia does not publish its imputed predictions.
- AnAge, Human Ageing Genomic Resources (de Magalhães et al.), used under CC BY 3.0.
- Oliveira, B.F. et al. (2017). AmphiBIO, a global database for amphibian ecological traits. Scientific Data 4:170123. Used under CC BY 4.0.
- GBIF Secretariat. GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Used under CC BY 4.0. Common names aggregated from constituent checklists.
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.