HELP!! Cage Too SMALL!!!

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

Hi this is my first time in a forum or raising a rep/anphibian. i live in loiuisiana and it is HOT all year. Because im 13 years old i still take orders from my parents. My CO is living in a quartsized hermit crab cage(minus the crab) with minimal water (1 inch),no filter and doesnt seem 2 eat. it dislikes the water and remains sitting on a limestone rock. My parents wont let me have anything larger even though we own a 10 gal glass aquarium and i have the money 2 get a small internal filter. Can he/she (not sure) live this way the were at the store that i bought them at but im not sure how long they were living this way. another thing my sister ,11, got 1 too.
THANX

peter · Jun 21, 2005

I'd really recommend a ten gallon tank or larger; there's no good way to maintain good water quality in a tank that small, and he will probably end up dying if kept like that. I also don't think that an inch of water would be sufficient. They also need it cool, anything above 72 degrees is generally getting close to lethal for many newts.

I don't know too much about rocks, but I'd think the limestone would increase the PH of the water, especially in such a small enclosure.

I hope you're able to use the larger tank, otherwise it might be wise to return the animals. Good luck with them regardless!

joan · Jun 21, 2005

You can put both of them into a 10 gallon tank with a small internal filter (as long as they're both the same species). That would be fine. But the hermit crab tank is WAY too small and is not adequate at all.

read http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Cynops/C_orientalis.shtml for some basic information. This should give you a good start.

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

i might MIGHT be able to talk my parents into letting me use the 10 gal tank. if i do will a dirt bottom be ok

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

my dad is way more lenient than my mom who gave a firm NO . we are going to go up in the attic and ill see if i can talk him into getting the tank down also i rinsed the rock b4 putting it in what kind of effects does ph have

ira · Jun 21, 2005

i dont think the limestone will have any affect on the pH to where it would adversly affect the newt. Pure water wont dissolve the limestone fast enough to change the pH higher than 8 (unless you left it in there for about a decade)

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

is higher or lower ph more acidic

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

Will a dirt bottom be ok? What type of plants should i use?

richard · Jun 21, 2005

Low pH = more acidic, high concentration of proton donors / electron pair acceptors... ^[H3O+]

High pH = more alkaline, high concentration of proton acceptors / electron pair donors... ^[OH-]

here's a site I found on the limestone

http://www.phadjustment.com/Limestone.htm

looks like it's ok... would get covered with a calcium salt and seal up its own leakage

chelsea · Jun 21, 2005

thanks

paris · Jun 22, 2005

based on you situation, id advise you to trade them in for different ones...(your parents i mean)...but since that probably isnt an option you can exercise, it does become necessary to put them in a larger more stable set up. the smallness of the current situation doesnt allow buffer room to help prevent against the water going bad fast, especially with 2 in that small an enclosure. they dont take well to water you say....what is the temperature in the room you are in?(highs and lows) CO's are harder to get to eat on land but it can be done-as long as you are starting with a healthy animal and create a comfortable set up. remember a lid will be a must. live plants require light to thrive, and adding a light to your situation will increase the temps in your set up-you may want to just use a layer of leaves and bark pieces on top of the dirt to help keep a nice moist microhabitat at the surface. how long have you two had these? have you ever seen them eat? ...feed us some more info and we can help more......

chelsea · Jun 22, 2005

there are no plants and a bare bottom. Just the plastic container with lid(has holes) about an inch of water and a limestone rock. they each have their own cage.

chelsea · Jun 22, 2005

In my earlier message i asked about plants. if i get the larger cage i will use sand and gravel for the bottom. will someone please get me a list of plants and a picture of what sized pebbles i should use 4 a chinese fbn

chelsea · Jun 22, 2005

ive had these for 4-5 days and never seen them eat though the newts all had some food given to them the day i gottem and there was none in my newts' cages. there wasnt enough water to absorb the food. i really thought they could live this way because at the store they only had a puddle, sponge, and extremely small individual containers.

james · Jun 22, 2005

It is best to use finer gravel or small pebbles. Newts don't seem to like large pebbles. In the wild the bottom of the ponds are mostly mud with small pebbles.

You can use any aquatic plants bought at the pet store. Newts love climbing up plants, so a fair number of plants is a good thing.

Water depth for CO's can vary. In the wild we have seen CO's at a depth of about 1.5 meters so far. My own newt tank is about 50cm deep and they love it. Just make sure they have some land area by stacking up a few rocks. Most CO's are even happy in water 10cm deep. I wouldn't recommend less than that.

Newts like live food best, so try and get some daphnia or mosquito larvae for them to eat. You can also use small earthworms or bloodworms. The smaller the newt the more picky they are about dry food. so experiment a bit and see.

Another interesting fact in my research is that CO's tend to eat mostly at night time, which is probably why most people don't see them eating!

chelsea · Jun 23, 2005

by daphnia do you mean frozen? will they come back to life once thawed? And what kind of plants to use for breeding(think cheap)?

ira · Jun 23, 2005

you should be worrying about getting them in proper housing before you start worrying about breeding them.

joseph · Jun 24, 2005

Yeah. You can't make them breed...you can only bribe them to

ester · Jun 24, 2005

Except for one or two really odd frogs/toads I don't believe there are animals that come back to life once they've been frozen.. So when live food is meant, we're not talking about frozen food.

As for daphnia, if there are small bodies of water near you try catching some. Just make sure you remove any water bugs that look like they could nibble on your newt.

Aquatic plants, elodea is what most people use, it's native in the US so maybe you can find that outdoors too. If you do, make sure you rinse it thoroughly and leave it in a bucket for a few hours, doing water changes to remove bugs.

chelsea · Jun 24, 2005

ive heard that earthworms come back to life after being frozen i cornmeal. im really new to this so i thought maybe that the same applied to daphnia. Could i get a picture of daphnia, i dont know what im looking 4.

sorry ira im getting ahead of myself. i have the larger cage, just not permission to use it.

Im trying to feed her flour beetle larva. it doesnt move much though. dendrobaena compost worms are supposed to be really wiggly. they dont sell them at the local pet shop but i diddnt check the sporting good store. they are said to be really popular fishing bait becase of their wiggliness and ability to survive in water for a longer time than other worms

thanks, all of you

HELP!! Cage Too SMALL!!!

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