The colour is a dusky brown, grey, or black with two longitudinal rows of paler small patches and many smaller pale speckles.

[5] The shovelnose salamander is found in the Appalachian Mountains in the southeastern United States at 300 to 1,680 metres (980 to 5,510 ft) above sea level.

The female attaches eggs singly or in small clumps to the underside of a rock in moving water.

The eggs hatch after about eleven weeks and the larvae hide among the gravel particles and feed on aquatic invertebrates.

It is affected by silting of the streams in which it lives through logging, agriculture and impoundment but occurs in a number of protected areas.