T. Dobrogicus Larvae questions

[Devin]

I recently ordered some Danube Crested Newt eggs from Michael Shrom, they are awesome and i had a bunch of the eggs but only 5 hatched, I currently have them in a small tank with aquarium sand and they have aged water in their tank from my adult newts tank. I am feeding them daphnia babies. I want everything for them to be as perfect as it can be, is there anything i should change?

Thanks

 

[Azhael]

Welcome to the forums!

I like to house larvae in stablished tanks with cycled water, too. Personally it works best for me. However, with this species, that can be a problem since they can be very cannibalistic and agressive, so housing many together is a risk. To be safe you have to house them individually, and for that, using smaller tanks/containers is simply more practical. If you have some live plants in each container, do partial water changes and remove uneaten foods, you should have no problems.

Out of curiosity, your adult´s tank where you get the aged water from, what species is it? There are some concerns if it´s a different species you should probably consider.

 

[Devin]

Welcome to the forums!

I like to house larvae in stablished tanks with cycled water, too. Personally it works best for me. However, with this species, that can be a problem since they can be very cannibalistic and agressive, so housing many together is a risk. To be safe you have to house them individually, and for that, using smaller tanks/containers is simply more practical. If you have some live plants in each container, do partial water changes and remove uneaten foods, you should have no problems.

Out of curiosity, your adult´s tank where you get the aged water from, what species is it? There are some concerns if it´s a different species you should probably consider.

i was thinking of my Daphnia culture i used my eastern newt water, i used my fish tanks water for the newts and they've been in it for awhile with no problems. Well how big of a tank would be good to house them all?

 

[Devin]

People have told me to put them in "shallow water". how deep would it be?

 

[caleb]

I wouldn't use less than 10 cm depth, and more than 20 cm is probably unnecessary.

If you are housing them together, you'll be less likely to have aggression issues if you feed them as often as possible (twice a day if you can), and use small foods they can swallow in one gulp (e.g. daphnia rather than bloodworm). This helps prevent fighting while feeding.

 

[ahritchie]

I also got some of these eggs from Michael Shrom; out of 20 eggs 12 hatched....but then I made the very bad newbie mistake of giving them a bunch of planaria (little tiny white worms) on the glass of my axolotl tank.....BAD idea....the planaria ate all but 2 of the larvae! I'm ordered some daphinia off ebay but they all died within 1 day because I had no algae culture for them So now I'm down to just 2 larvae and am giving them crushed newt pellets and brine shrimp....hopefully they make it. Somebody should put a big warning in the live food section to warn others of feeding planaria to larvae.... Good luck with yours!

 

[mr cyclone]

like most cresties they are highly carniverous and will quickly cannabilise each other regardless of food supply. My best experience with them is 10 cm of water a few aquatic plants and pleanty food although you will need to keep an eye on their sizes as i always ended up with a mutant who would grow 3 times faster than the rest and hoovers up everything else in the tank - plenty of hides helps too

 

[Devin]

like most cresties they are highly carniverous and will quickly cannabilise each other regardless of food supply. My best experience with them is 10 cm of water a few aquatic plants and pleanty food although you will need to keep an eye on their sizes as i always ended up with a mutant who would grow 3 times faster than the rest and hoovers up everything else in the tank - plenty of hides helps too

What other foods can i feed them? i have a hard time getting daphnia.

 

[Azhael]

Bloodworms, small earthworms, whiteworms, and when they get a bit bigger i´ve also had great results feeding them pellets. They are absolute eating machines, they grow fast and eat a hell of a lot.

 

[Devin]

Bloodworms, small earthworms, whiteworms, and when they get a bit bigger i´ve also had great results feeding them pellets. They are absolute eating machines, they grow fast and eat a hell of a lot.

What kind of blood worms? like freeze dried or live or what?

 

[Jennewt]

What kind of blood worms? like freeze dried or live or what?

In the US, frozen bloodworms are available in most pet shops, and recommended. Some small shops (not the big chain stores) sell live blackworms, which they sometimes stupidly call "live bloodworms" (but they aren't bloodworms). These are awesome. Don't bother with freeze dried.

 

[taapua]

[ I'm ordered some daphinia off ebay but they all died within 1 day because I had no algae culture for them

Next time feed the daphnia some yeast dissolved in water. I have found that works very well for my cultures, both indoors and out.