Question: Egg laying female.....

[Dipsy66]

Sat quietly watching the TV this afternoon and I noticed my female axie acting really weird...zooming up and down the front of the tank.....swimming, something she's never done before.....I switched the tank light on and watched her for a while.....it was like she was stressed out and then I noticed she was vigourously rubbing herself on plants and the barrel in the tank.

On closer inspection she is laying eggs.....EVERYWHERE.....not quite what I expected for Christmas. Some are black, some white and some half and half.

Am not sure what I'm going to do with them....but don't think I will let them all hatch...might just save half a dozen and see what happens.

My Question is....how do I know which are viable and which aren't? Or is it just a luck of the drawer?

 

[Morrison]

I'd take them out and see if they change shape. The ones that are still perfect spheres after 4 days are probably 'rubbish'. If you leave them in the tank, your axie will probably eat them. But ofcourse, if you don't want to keep all of them you can leave the ones you don't want in the tank
Congratzalotl!

 

[auntiejude]

a dozen is a good number if you're a novice. Up to day 5 you can freeze them to kill them if you're not going to keep them.

Axies don't generally eat eggs until they start moving inside, but a few may get nibbled. It's best to remove eggs sooner rather than later though, and easier to watch what's developing.

I suggest you get a daphnia culture going, read up on BBS hatching, invest in some plastic tubs, and start looking for a little tank for the babies.

Good luck!

 

[Dipsy66]

Thank you both...I might leave them for 5 days and see if any change, then I'll pick out 6 as a complete novice and will freeze the rest to euthanize them humanely.

Mum is still going mad swimming round the tank....I think dad is going to have to come live with me in my office whilst Rosie in the office will have to come home and live with Amanda......I don't want this on a regular basis and don't want my female exhausted by all the egg laying.

Will look at the Daphnia.......wow! What a Christmas present (all goodness knows how many of them!!)

 

[Dipsy66]

Well, I decided to remove the eggs from the large tank and keep them separate so I can keep an eye on them....I know I didn't get them all....so the ones I missed in the tank will have to take their chances. If I spot any babies I'll try to fish them out to save them....am thinking I may try to keep 6 if they are viable......really not sure what to do with the rest!!!

Some of my eggs are black, some white and a few are half and half????? Does this mean I could end up with some pretty unusual colours?

Dad is Leucistic and mum is a wild type.

My husband is well excited at the prospect of watching them grow............

 

[Dipsy66]

Development so far....have picked out 16 well developed eggs....and one is a set of twins....

 

[auntiejude]

Looking good! They'll be looking like real axolotls soon, and they'll start wriggling.

 

[Dipsy66]

auntiejude I have hatchlings :happy:....two birthed this morning, Boxing day 2013 (whooohooooooo).....:happy:

I was totally stunned because the eggs were only laid on the 14th December but the babies seem lively and healthy looking.

I have a couple of questions I'm hoping you can answer ? If you don't mind of course?

1) Can I use water from the parents tanks to do my daily water changes? The amount I will need will only be small as I only kept 16 eggs out of the 600 + that were laid....my first time so I wasn't sure how successful I would be....2 eggs look to be duds, the rest are developing nicely, including the twins :happy:.

2) The lady I got my two adults from (the parents of this batch of eggs) has told me she was successful feeding her hatchlings on very small amounts of frozen Daphnia and bloodworm without having to use live bait.....do you think I'd be successful doing the same?

Any help you can give is muchly appreciated.

 

[auntiejude]

Yay babies . 12 days is fine, text book says 14 days from laying to hatching, give or take a bit according to temperature.
One of my females decided to present me with 600 eggs on Xmas eve....:shocked:

Tank water is fine. You have to remember that without filtration the baby tubs will get dirty and have an ammonia build up quite quickly, so you need to change water every day. I found it just as easy to keep a camping 10L water carrier handy.

Tiny babies don't 'hunt' as such, they tend to wait for tiny things to come into reach and then snap at them. BBS really is the best food for them. Bloodworm really is too big for newly hatched larvae. Although I have heard of people using frozen food, and even cooked hen's egg yolks in a pinch, they generally do not respond to non-moving food. So to use frozen daphnia you would have to spend a lot of time just dripping the food in front of them to simulate live swimming food. BBS aren't difficult to hatch yourself - I recommend decpsulated eggs for speed and simplicity. Once they are about 3-4 weeks old you can try them with chopped frozen bloodworm - mine responded very quickly to the change of menu. But it's really up to you - they are your babies!