External gills usually contains muscle tissue, and may be moved by the animal as a free appendage, in order to stir up stagnant water. The stalk is lined by many thinly walled filaments (fimbriae), containing the majority of blood vessels used in gas exchange. Animals usually have one external gill originating on each gill arch (except the hyoid), which leads to there being three pairs of external gills in salamanders, and four in the gilled larvae of lungfish. External gills External gills are the gills of an animal, most typically an amphibian, that are exposed to the environment, rather than set inside
External gills salamander species, such as most members of the Proteidae family (the olm and mudpuppies) and the Sirenidae family, which naturally never metamorphose into an air-breathing form. The embryos of frogs and caecilians also develop external gills at some point in their development, though these are either resorbed before or disappear shortly after hatching. Fossils of the distant relatives of modern amphibians, such as "Branchiosaurus" and "Apateon", also show evidence of external gills. The external gills commonly consist of a single stalk (rami) protruding from a gill arch behind the head of the animal, above an associated gill slit. The stalk