Species Focus Area
Amphibians breathe and absorb through their skin, which makes them among the first species to register pollution and habitat change. Reptiles are slow to replace losses once adults are removed.
These animals sit in the middle of food webs, eating insects and being eaten in turn. Their long lives and low reproduction rates mean populations recover slowly.
Common threats
How people can help
These ten are not a scientific ranking. They were selected for conservation urgency, teaching value, and regional relevance, and each one has a complete, sourced profile.
Critically Endangered (IUCN) / Endangered (ESA)
Lepidochelys kempii
The world's smallest and most endangered sea turtle, nesting almost entirely on a short stretch of Gulf coastline in Mexico and Texas.
Critically Endangered (IUCN) / Endangered (ESA)
Eretmochelys imbricata
A coral reef turtle hunted for centuries for its patterned shell, sold as tortoiseshell, and still critically endangered worldwide.
Endangered (IUCN and ESA)
Anaxyrus houstonensis
One of the first animals ever protected under U.S. endangered species law, now found in only a few central Texas counties.
Vulnerable (IUCN); Threatened (ESA in part of range)
Gopherus polyphemus
A keystone burrowing tortoise of southeastern pine uplands whose burrows shelter hundreds of other species.
Least Concern (IUCN); Threatened (Texas state listed)
Phrynosoma cornutum
The Texas state reptile, once common in yards and schoolyards and now largely gone from the eastern half of the state.
Endangered (IUCN) / Threatened (ESA)
Pituophis ruthveni
One of the rarest snakes in North America, dependent on longleaf pine savanna and the pocket gophers that dig its shelter.
Vulnerable (IUCN); ESA listing proposed for the eastern subspecies
Cryptobranchus alleganiensis alleganiensis
North America's largest salamander, breathing through its skin in fast, clean streams and disappearing as those streams fill with silt.
Vulnerable (IUCN) / Endangered (ESA)
Eurycea sosorum
A gilled salamander that lives only in the spring outlets at Barton Springs in Austin, Texas, and nowhere else on earth.
Critically Endangered (IUCN), possibly extinct in the wild
Atelopus zeteki
Panama's national symbol, possibly extinct in the wild since the late 2000s and surviving in a network of captive assurance colonies.
Vulnerable (IUCN) / Threatened (ESA, Florida population)
Crocodylus acutus
A coastal crocodile of mangrove estuaries whose Florida population recovered enough to be downlisted from endangered to threatened in 2007.