In need of advice baby axolotls different sizes

[Lisa24]

Ok I am in need of some advice and help please, I have over 100 baby axolotls almost 4 weeks old, I have been giving them live daphnia but it is getting very costly buying the bags as they eat a lot, I have baby’s in diffrent sizes from small, medium to large I keep them all in containers with size small are together in groups of 15 and mediums together in groups of 10 and large together in groups of 5 so not risking any more deaths as I started with 304 now at 180 as for last 2 weeks I had put them in order with groups as mentioned and they all been doing well, it’s just costing a lot each week buying daphnia for £20 a week and I tried the larger baby’s on frozen blood worm but they did not eat it, larger baby’s have front legs developing already, any advice would be great, and setting up a culture for daphnia has been done many times but crashed so I was maybe hoping a solution like frozen daphnia or brine shrimp would they eat it? And also when can I put large baby’s all together in more a group of 5 as I have asi know they can be cannibalistic at the time but when is it safe to put them together in a large tank many thanks

 

[JM29]

Hi,
Baby axolotls can develop cannibalistic trends as soon as they develop legs.
The problem of size differences frequently happens when shifting from daphnia to other food (thawed blood worms for example).

My last batch hatched on march 20th. They are now 3 weeks old and have always been fed with daphnia. They are 3 cm long, with not yet size differences and not yet cannibalism. Fortunately we are in spring and free wild caught daphnia are readily available in ponds in the country. They are all the time with daphnia though I begin to give them blood worms.

I chosed to keep only 20, because I know I'll have to separate them soon in little groups and I've not the capacity of raising more. I'll keep them in 6 buckets (40 x 30 x 25 cm) with a lot of plants (Egeria, Ceratophyllum) so that they won't meet too often. The buckets will be in my garden, under bushes, so that they will be in the shadow and benefits from slugs and woodlice which will fall in the water during summer.

Young axolotls usually loose their cannibalistic trends when they reach 15 cm (6 inches).