Question for axolotl/newt keepers

[luca1980]

Hi guys, I was wondering if anyone had any experience with axolotls who refuse to eat?

I have 5 axies and one of them (Dennis) has not eaten for about 3 weeks now and I am getting worried. He and his friends are fed frozen bloodworm cubes, frozen axolotl cubes, freeze dried black worm cubes and hikari jumbo carnivore sticks. They are all fed by hand.

Tank is 4 foot long, lots of caves, planted with val and anubias, dimly lit with sand substrate. I have a chiller so the temp is constantly kept at 18 degrees Celsius.

pH is 7.6
Ammonia is zero
Nitrite is zero
Nitrate is zero
I do 50% water changes weekly without fail

He looks fine and is acting normally and as yet has not lost any body condition. Its just the not eating that is starting to worry me.

I am also a member of caudate.org and have posted this on their forum but have not received any replies.

Any advice/comments etc are warmly welcomed. Thank you!

 

[betta fish]

Hi, when you say you feed by hand do you hold the food up to their mouth until they eat? I have kept axolotls in the past and always just drop the food in front of them and they generally just eat this way, they seemed to particularly relish the small brown sinking catfish pellets but were also partial to live earthworms, if you can find any I would try some, a wriggling earthworm near an axolotls mouth is hard to resist! just make sure it is not too big so the axie can snap it up in one go

 

[luca1980]

Hi, when you say you feed by hand do you hold the food up to their mouth until they eat? I have kept axolotls in the past and always just drop the food in front of them and they generally just eat this way, they seemed to particularly relish the small brown sinking catfish pellets but were also partial to live earthworms, if you can find any I would try some, a wriggling earthworm near an axolotls mouth is hard to resist! just make sure it is not too big so the axie can snap it up in one go

Hi betta fish, thanks for your reply. I do hold food up to their mouths to eat and I wiggle it from side to side. I found that if I leave food in a dish for them or in front of their face it usually got ignored and then just started to deteriorate the water quality. I did however, start two worm farms yesterday and Dennis did finally eat when I offered him his first live worm It was quite an impressive gulp actually!

I forgot to mention that I also have a colony of glass/ghost shrimp in the tank who have slowly been disappearing over the past few weeks - I am starting to suspect that Dennis is the culprit and has started taking a liking to live food I know that there is a lot of debate about mixing species in an axie tank - I am completely against feeder fish or even apple/mystery snails with axies but the shrimp have been very successful - both for environmental enrichment, an extra food source and also as a cleanup crew for any bits of food I miss. They largely hide in the plants and cause no harm to the axies.

Anyway, earthworms are on the menu now so Dennis and his mates should be pretty happy. Thank you again for your reply and advice, it is greatly appreciated!

 

[Mr. Bones]

I would do a 15-20% water change, are there any signs of pinkness of the skin and gills ? that could indicate a systemic infection.

i would also check the temp, and ammonia levels, Axolotls release a lot of wastes.

 

[luca1980]

I would do a 15-20% water change, are there any signs of pinkness of the skin and gills ? that could indicate a systemic infection.

i would also check the temp, and ammonia levels, Axolotls release a lot of wastes.

Water temp is kept at a constant 18 degrees Celsius which is ideal for axolotls. I do 50% water changes weekly and my latest results from the API master test kit indicated that ammonia is zero.