larval death

[lims]

i only had a small group of larval axolotl i got from a friend (6/7). i lost 2 in the first few weeks, i have just lost 2 more and one looks like he's going, all the defective or dead ones had a little curl at the end of the tail along a tiny bit of what might be fungus or algae, anyone seen this before?
I've been partial water changing and putting a whole bag of daphnia in every day (after filtering and washing them) i dont know what else i can do...

 

[Kaysie]

The curled tail would indicate some sort of stress.

How big is the container you're keeping them in? What are the water parameters?

 

[lims]

its a small plastic tank like you get in pet shops, its definetly big enough. i raised the water level to about 3 cm instead of 2, could this stress them?
How do larva (and newts at that matter) deal with load-ish volumes of music? its not that load and its always been like that so they should be used to it.
sometimes keeping caudates is more testing and heart-wrenching than i can bare, alas, i love them all

 

[jcb118]

by water parameters, kaysie means temperature, ammonia, pH, nitrate, nitrite, etc. Frequency and amounts of water changes are also helpful to know.
Caudates (to my knowledge) are not sound-sensitive, but they are adept at picking up vibrations. Unless you have the tank in front of or on a subwoofer, I would not consider this a source of stress. Neither would I consider the small change in the water depth a possibility.

 

[mary_kate]

How big is the bag of daphnia? I'm wondering if perhaps the water is becoming a little contaminated? I would fill the container up a lot higher than 2 cm (to dilute polluting effect of any dead food or organic waste) and I would tend to do almost complete water changes for a while. All the best.

 

[Jennewt]

I agree with Deb - they need more water and probably less food. Until they are stabilized, I'd recommend a change to a clean container daily.

 

[Kudos]

tail turning?

HelloI'm new here but anyway I have finally found another person with baby axolotls with turned tails. My 2 adults bred unexpectedly and most of the babies died. Nearly all the babies that died had a turned tail. I currently have 32 left which are 23 days old and only just reaching 1.5cm