Training Newts to eat Bloodworms on their own

[mrbgilson]

Hi, Do you have Any tips to get my Firebelly newts to eat their frozen bloodworms independently? Currently, the bloodworms are thawed out in a small dish of water, but the newts will only eat them if I have a clump of them on a toothpick, or occasionally, they will eat some that they dropped. Eventually, the newts will be more aquatic, and I can't sit there to hand-feed them. Any tips to help them learn?

 

[minorhero]

How long have they been in the tank?

 

[mrbgilson]

How long have they been in the tank?

Couple months, growing great. I feed them bloodworms and fruit flies. They hunt the flies but once they are in the water more I worry that they won't know how to eat lol

 

[minorhero]

They will know just fine. What's happening is that they are preferring live food and more then willing to hold out to get it. Once they go aquatic they will still like live food but will be willing to eat frozen. Likely they will eat frozen now if they got hungry enough. Good luck.

 

[mrbgilson]

They will know just fine. What's happening is that they are preferring live food and more then willing to hold out to get it. Once they go aquatic they will still like live food but will be willing to eat frozen. Likely they will eat frozen now if they got hungry enough. Good luck.

Thanks. That is good to know. I am happy to feed them live as long as I can get ahold of it.

 

[stanleyc]

You can maybe start getting them trained to eat the frozen bloodworms in preparation. You can put a small dish in the enclosure, attract their attention with the worms on the toothpick, once you get their attention, place it into the dish. If all goes well you should be able to get them to eating directly from the dish. When they move to aquatic, just put the dish in there during feeding time, and drop your bloodworms on it. I did this once before when raising some C. orientalis morphs terrestrially. But usually I think they're much better eaters in the water anyways, so you shouldn't have too much to worry about. I would definitely look into getting your hands on some blackworms, tubifex worms, or earthworms though, the movement will definitely stimulate feeding, and will provide better nutrition if you feed live worms as well as the frozen.