🐸 Hellbender report template
Three versions, one page each. Print the one for your child’s grade. The facts come from the hellbender page, every number with its source.
Grades 1–2
My report: the hellbender
Cryptobranchus alleganiensis · Grades 1–2
| Length | 24 in (61 cm) |
|---|---|
| Height at the shoulder | not checked yet: look it up! |
| Weight | 4.9 lb (2.2 kg) |
| Top speed | not checked yet: look it up! |
| How long it lives | 40 years |
Read about it
The hellbender is a big, flat salamander. It lives under rocks in cold, clear streams. Its skin is wrinkly and slimy.
It lives in:
It eats:
The coolest thing I learned:
Where my facts came from
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 'A Salamander's Struggle for Survival', fws.gov/story/2021-02/salamanders-struggle-survival, checked 2026-10-30
- Smithsonian's National Zoo, nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/hellbender, checked 2026-10-30
Grades 3–4
My report: the hellbender
Cryptobranchus alleganiensis · Grades 3–4
| Length | 24 in (61 cm) |
|---|---|
| Height at the shoulder | not checked yet: look it up! |
| Weight | 4.9 lb (2.2 kg) |
| Top speed | not checked yet: look it up! |
| How long it lives | 40 years |
Read about it
A hellbender has loose, wrinkly folds of skin along its sides. The folds give it more skin to take in oxygen from the fast, cool water. It hides under big flat rocks in the daytime and hunts crayfish at night.
Where it lives (its habitat):
What it eats:
How its body helps it live there:
My favorite fact:
A question I still have:
Where my facts came from
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 'A Salamander's Struggle for Survival', fws.gov/story/2021-02/salamanders-struggle-survival, checked 2026-10-30
- Smithsonian's National Zoo, nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/hellbender, checked 2026-10-30
Grades 5–6
My report: the hellbender
Cryptobranchus alleganiensis · Grades 5–6
| Length | 24 in (61 cm) |
|---|---|
| Height at the shoulder | not checked yet: look it up! |
| Weight | 4.9 lb (2.2 kg) |
| Top speed | not checked yet: look it up! |
| How long it lives | 40 years |
Read about it
Hellbenders are the largest salamanders in North America, and they spend their whole lives in the water. They need cool, clear, fast streams with plenty of oxygen and loose rocks to hide under, so they are a sign of a healthy stream. Muddy or warm water makes them disappear from a stream. Zoos raise young hellbenders and set them free in streams, and people plant trees along the banks to keep the water cool and clean.
Habitat and range: where on Earth, and what the place is like:
Diet: what it eats, and what might eat it:
Adaptations: two ways its body or habits help it survive:
Is it in danger? Why or why not?:
Compare it with another animal you know:
Bibliography: write each source below as site, page title, date checked:
Where my facts came from
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 'A Salamander's Struggle for Survival', fws.gov/story/2021-02/salamanders-struggle-survival, checked 2026-10-30
- Smithsonian's National Zoo, nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/hellbender, checked 2026-10-30