On a cold night in 2018, Peng Yong spotted several wild Chinese giant salamanders.

"That night, as usual, I was wearing a headlamp and using a flashlight to observe along a stream. Suddenly, I saw something moving very fast in the water. Inspecting closer, I realized they were giant salamanders," Peng said. "I was so surprised and thrilled."

In 2016, Peng became the head of an ecological management station in Jiuling Mountain, Jing'an county in Jiangxi province. He patrols the area most nights, observing various aquatic and terrestrial plants.

Jing'an has a tradition of breeding giant salamanders, so the colleague accompanying Peng didn't think much of it at the time.

However, Peng recorded the location, took photos and sent them to experts. To his surprise, one expert responded, "This is very likely a wild Chinese giant salamander," he said.

Giant salamanders, known for their impressive size, remain critically endangered in nature. They typically grow to about one meter in length and can weigh up to 50 kilograms. They eat fish, frogs, shrimp and aquatic insects in the water and have a life span of up to 120 years in the wild.

Wild giant salamanders are extremely rare and are mainly found in tributaries above 1,500 meters of the Yangtze River, Yellow River and Pearl River basins.

To confirm his discovery, Peng continued to observe at night and captured videos of more wild giant salamanders, including footage of them hunting.

This finding has attracted much attention. Soon, the Kunming Institute of Zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the Jiangxi Academy of Sciences formed a special research team and went to Jing'an.

After two years of monitoring, the researchers published their findings in 2022, describing the population discovered in Jing'an as a new species — the Jiangxi giant salamander, or Andrias jiangxiensis.

"This is the only known species of Chinese giant salamanders today with a genetically pure, reproducing, in situ population," said the research paper published in the academic journal Zoological Research in May 2022.

This discovery is an "ecological echo" of the past two decades of wild giant salamander conservation efforts in Jing'an county.