My Newts are attacking each other

[ali]

I've had fire-bellied newts before, in fact one survived until sometime during february of this year, which made it about eleven. but my family bought four newts for easter, and one of them happened to have one of its front hands missing. Recently though, all of the newts have been really aggressive, and they have started to attack one another, and sometimes gang up on the one with 3 hands... Is this normal, and is there anything i can do?

 

[ester]

More information would be helpful. What kind of newt do you have. How large is the aquarium. Do you have a lot of hiding places in it.

things like that.

 

[paris]

look at this page and tell us what kind it is - skin type and head/tail shape are the best fast identifiers of mystery 'fire belly newts'
here is the link http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/firebelly.shtml

 

[ali]

My newts are definitely chinese fire belly newts. They are kept in a normal sized aquarium with 3.5-4.5 inches water, and three large rocks, 2 that are squareish, and one that goes over the top of the square ones to form a bridge....so there are several hiding spaces. I don't however have plants in the aquarium, I've been meaning to redo the set up in the aquarium.

 

[benjamin]

Unless they're eating, chinese firebelly newts are the most non aggressive newts I've ever kept, that's pretty unusual.

 

[james]

I have eight firebellies in one tank and generally they get along well together. Two of them do have the occassional scuffle, but nothing too serious. It seems as though it is biggest one bullying the weakest, so maybe has got something to do with the pecking order ...

 

[dani]

my bro-in-law has three c.orientalis in a ten gallon. one of them had only three legs, but its grown back. they are all very agressive at feeding time and apparently are biting each other over the food. i havent seen the action myself, but it seems kinda strange. my COs will occasionally bite one another because a limb got in the way of a targeted worm - but not intentionally.

 

[pamela]

How often do you feed your newts? You might want to try more feedings. If newts get really hungry, they'll grab onto anything that's near food.

Also, C.o. appreciate water. I keep my C.o. in around 8" of water (in a 10g). You might want to raise the water level.

As long as there is plenty of swimming area, and food, my newts get along well.