Creating a habitat for Pachytriton

[annmarie]

I am redoing the home of my Patchytriton to look similar to the other tanks in my tank room. All my tanks are planted tanks with no silly store decorations. I have a sinlge patchytriton. He currently lives in a 10-gallon.

I was wondering was sort of plants can thrive in a patchy triton setup. Ones that are ideal for the monster to climb on, etc.ones that will not upset the water flow and ones that will especially thrive in his colder nontropical temperature water. I am not trying to create a biotope but a habitat. Any pictures of any Patchytriton tank habitats are encouraged so I can get a better idea. Also what sort of rocks would be good for him to climb on and hide with. He is on barebotton with river rocks now, but planted tanks need substrate. Would he be safe with flourite? What is a comon Patchytrition substrate in a planted tank habitat?

Thanks you for help creating a better Patchytriton habitat in his house. He will be very very happy.

 

[heather]

I too have a bare bottom tank to house my lone pachy. The only plant I have used are cuttings from my pothos plant. The plants like to float and so I have wedged some of them between rocks to keep them stationary. The water is cold (about 63C) and the plants have been doing fine since I put them in there this past spring. I have also used rocks (about the size of my fist) from my yard to make stacks of rocks, where my pachy can hide in the nooks and crawl over as well. I also have one terra cotta pot in there as well, but she seems to prefer the rocks to the pot. I have taken some pics with my camera but right now I don't have a way to download them to my computer - otherwise I would post them for you.
I hope others will post their setups as well and good luck,
Heather

 

[annmarie]

Thanks. I have been working on it with things I have had and will probably be aquiring more aquatic mosses and rocks over the next month or so.
My guy likes to rest vertically, rather than horizontally. I will proably post in the photos gallery for more help. Thanks for you input, and when ever you get pics up that would be great.

 

[erik]

I use java fern and java and willow moss in some of my tanks in other more naturalistic tanks, I use just rocks.

In the wild habitat of P.labiatus I didn't see any plants at all. Just rocks.

 

[jennifer]

Erik, interesting. Same with N. strauchii habitat - no plants, just lots of rocks of various sizes. Any other observations you have about P. labiatus habitats? Size of streams? Temperature? Mud versus all rocks? If you can list some general points, I'd like to add them to the CC caresheet (we could cite you for the info, if that's OK).

 

[wouter]

Erik, there are some pics in Adler & Zhao's Herpetology of China of Pachytriton habitat, these brooks run through forested areas. Where in China did you see that type of habitat? Jennifer, when looking at the pictures at the above cited book I noticed that the brooks looked a lot like the strauchii brooks in Turkey, a bit bigger but also very fast flowing.

 

[erik]

I have pictures but unfortunately they are on my other pc which is currently not working (lightening strike). I visited the habitat near the type locality for labiatus:

http://research.amnh.org/herpetology/amphibia/references.php?id=27419

In general I would consider the habitat (based on only a few sites in the same general area)to be shallow, flowing, rocky streams with some waterfalls. The water was moving pretty swift but I got the impression that they tend to stay in the more still areas. The streams were 100% rocks/gravel-no mud, no plants, but did run in and out of fairly dense forest. As far as temps- we saw water temps in the 60's F during August but that was after heavy rain.

It was pretty awesome to see wild specimens.

 

[annmarie]

It is great to hear all this information about natural habitat. Thanks. I think I am doing pretty well and guessed well, for I set up all sorts of rock piles, because i observed he liked the rockpile areas the best(as in he would spend most of his time there)
Thanks. It was pretty cool you got to see wild specimens.

 

[annmarie]

Well, i am still slowly getting things toegether CORRECTLY but here is what i have thus far in my creation. I am trying to keep plants to a minimum. I am working on the stone work more. He seems to love to frolic in my expermental rock pile of ricer rock. He moves them arround and goes under and in and over them like a snake. After I get more plants in, the substrate (which is Flourite. wil be covered, with a mixture of rockwork and ground cover plants. The plastic arround the filter is getting some willow moss sewn to it. This exhists to keep Mr. Newt from crawling into the filter and sleeping.

Any suggestions are welcome.

NOTE: the Brazil sword baby and the Echinodorus are temporary plant residents. I have them there on purpose, but I plant to move them to another tank I am setting up(in the long run, the temp is too low for them to grow correctly, they are tropicals and need water over 21 degrees, if anyone else plans to keep them.



I did not spend any time trying to create a great picture. Sorry for the bad quality and reflection of the light. Maybe After I get things done here i will bring out the *good* camera and tripod.