It’s like a waterdog. I hate those goddam things.

We had these things we called ‘water boatmen’ in my parent’s pool.  I think they are pretty common in lakes and ponds in N.A.  Harmless but creepy, they’re some kind of swimming insect. (As opposed to the Axolotl in the article which oddly is actually a salamander that apparently never develops out of its tadpole phase).

Although I’ve known about these salamanders since I was a kid (I did read a lot besides erotic fantasy) I immediately thought of Dune. Specifically (from Wikipedia):

Axlotl tank

For the non-fictional animal, see Axolotl.
Axlotl tanks are a fictional technology in the Dune universe created by Frank Herbert. Axlotl technology is also mentioned in Herbert’s novels Destination: Void and the The Jesus Incident but not elaborated upon. The name is presumably derived from the axolotl, an aquatic salamander native to Mexico known for its regenerative abilities.
A trade secret of the Tleilaxu, an axlotl tank is a “device for reproducing a living human being from the cells of a cadaver,"[12] a type of clone called a ghola.[8] Later in the series, the axlotl tanks are engineered to be capable of producing the spice melange, previously only available on the desert planet Arrakis.[12]