Nearly all of their time is spent underground in burrows of other animals or burrows they have constructed themselves. Occasionally they are found above ground on damp or humid nights. I did, however, observe an adult hastily crossing a sandy road on a hot summer day with no rainfall and one found under a rock on a hillside while searching for milk snakes. They often fall into window wells or are found in damp basements. The only time they are found above ground in numbers are during heavy spring and fall rains while they migrate to and from overwintering sites.
Tiger Salamanders breed in spring, often before all the ice has melted from the ponds' surface.
Females may lay 100 eggs in loose masses. The larvae metamorphose in August and September and may be smaller upon transformation then when they were larvae. They overwinter underground in burrows or other debris in October. Both adults and larvae alike are extremely voracious feeders consuming anything that is smaller than themselves. They snap quickly and sometimes use their tongue to catch prey, but they are also very clumsy hunters.