Skinny?

[yvette]

i got my first axolotl last week, i called shim Horatio. i wasn't even told i was getting one so i was completely unprepared. a few people have told me shim looks a bit skinny, but i don't think so, i think it may be a male but im unsure of how to tell.

 

[joan]

A little skinny. Even if it is a male, the body should be about as wide as the head.

 

[emily]

Its not tooo skinny. How old is it? sometimes when they are smaller they grow long ways before they grow fat. My babies have grown so much in length and they look much the same fattness as yours (but smaller in length). You could try to fatten them up quickly by feeding them beef heart. Did you get it from a petshop? they tend to feed the minimum amount of food so once you have it for a while it'll soon fatten up

 

[yvette]

thanks! i have no idea how old it is, its 8 inches long. i did get it from the pet shop, and they had those feeder fish in with them, which is the only thing mine has been eating since i got it. i haven't tried it anything else yet, but i will now, thanks

 

[teesha]

axolotls do not store fat under the skin....so how wide the axy is is how much food is inside, not fat. There is a finger like projective structure inside which sotres fat, so there should just be a bulge where that is, but it is placed inbetween nooks and crannys in the intestines and guts. So the axy should be as wide as its head, or else it is not going to get by.
i hate it when i see skinny as axies at pet shops...theyre stomach dints in instead of out!! horrible!

 

[lorie]

Mine gets really skinny after a big pooping session lol.

 

[edward]

Snip "axolotls do not store fat under the skin....so how wide the axy is is how much food is inside, not fat. There is a finger like projective structure inside which sotres fat, so there should just be a bulge where that is, but it is placed inbetween nooks and crannys in the intestines and guts. So the axy should be as wide as its head, or else it is not going to get by"endsnip

This is not totally accurate. There are fat pads in the in the abdominal cavity but they are not inbetween the nooks and crannies as they are long solid discrete structures on their own. If the axolotls is obese these fat pads can displace or compress organs in the abdominal cavity and if the axoltls is sufficiently obese they can make the animal very round. For example look at how this obese Ambystoma opacum looks.

 

[yvette]

Lorie said her's loses a bit after a big pooping session,,, iv had mine for 11 days so far, and it has eaten 13 fish, and nothing. there is no waste to be seen, i know he hasn't hid it because there is nowhere as i still haven't got anything for the bottom of the tank? is it sick or something? i was told they go to the toilet a lot.