Water averse C.o. with fungus

D

dale

Guest
I don't have too much experience with newts (had a pair of CFBN as a child when I was too young to deal with things like water quality or temperature or making sure my friends put the lid back on correctly!), and four weeks ago I bought a C.o. from a pet store that is pretty reliable with regards to fish. She was very water averse when first put into our tank. I tested the water to make sure there were no water quality issues. The temperature is about 70F, and the water is about 6.5ph with no detectable ammonia.

After about 3 weeks of her refusing to enter the water (and she would try to run away when I would mist her with water), I decided to follow the recommendations of several people on this forum and force her to stay in the water by removing the land. I sunk the floating island to about 1/2 inch below the surface. The tank is also well planted, with a lot of plants reaching the surface and providing good resting places.

She freaked out for a bit but then started acting normally and sitting around on plants and rocks under water. She shows interest in food and eats blackworms and frozen bloodworms when I feed her every 2-3 days.

Unfortunately, when I looked at her yesterday, she seemed to have a few small white spots on her. They are only visible from certain angles and in certain lighting, and when I remove her from the water, I can't seem them at all. There were maybe 5 spots on her back and one on her side at about the base of her tail. Worried that this was fungus, I took her out and gave her a 15min salt bath. I gave her her land back and she immediately left the water and has not returned for several hours.

First off, could this be something other than an infection? It seems odd to me that it's so difficult to see, except at the right angles. Do newts have small patches like this before they shed their skin? Should I continue to give her salt baths? Could her immediate run for land a reaction to the ickyness of the salt bath? Should I let her stay on land until she's better?

I will try to take pictures of the possible fungus, but it's difficult since I can't see it when she's out of the water, and she's gone back to being water averse.
 
The salt bath may have done more harm than good. It probably stressed her more than anything. It's better to diagnose a problem before trying to treat it.
 
C.o. have small white dots along their lateral line. Some individuals spots are more prevalent than others. Could this be what you are seeing? Take a look at some of the close-up shots of these newts on this forum, and Caudata Culture.
 
Sometimes newts will get silvery spots of trapped air stuck to their skin. This would only be visible when the newt is in the water.
 
Thanks for all of the quick responses!

Pamela, I looked through a lot of the material on CC, and I read through a lot of the archives of this forum when I first got the newt, and I don't remember seeing anything that looked like this. I will keep looking, but it is also hard, since I can't find any pictures online of newts with fungus to compare to.

What my newt had, especially the spot on her tail, definitely did not appear to be part of her body. I looked like something white-ish hanging off of her (and not an air bubble), which is why I hoped she was just getting ready to shed or something. I worried a lot since many people have commented that newts hide illness until just before they keel over, which is why I gave her the salt water bath before I could get any diagnosis.

On the positive side, whatever that white stuff was, it's not there any more. If it comes back, I'll post here again to try to get some sort of diagnosis before doing anything.

Thanks again for the help. =)
 
Ok, so she has been out of the water all day today. The spot at the base of her tail that I thought had fungus seems to have some sort of sore or lesion. It's lighter that her normal skin color, though it is not white, and despite the rest of her being completely dry, this area looks wet-ish and slimey.

When I took her out of the tank to try to get a picture, she was completely uncooperative and started running all over. I was unable to get a picture that would show the area.

Any suggestions? Should I let her stay on land? Is this likely something that will heal on its own?
 
Take the picture while she's in the tank, she shouldn't be too stressed, in fact most of my newts follow the camera along the side of the tank. Try not getting too much flash because the newt may end up being too shiny to tell what the problem is.
 
Ok, so I tried again today, and she's a little more photogenic. I'm horrible with a camera, but hopefully these pictures will help. Look at the reddish discoloration at the base of her tail. There's a white spot at the tip of her tail in one of the pictures, but it's just lighting. Also, she did shed her skin today, so I'm really hoping the "fungus" thing was just that.

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Lastly, I had been under the impression when I got it that the newt was a female, but I'm beginning to think it's a male. I don't know if you can tell from these pictures, but is "she" a he?
 
Thank you, Jennifer. I had seen the article but didn't want to start any type of treatment until someone could confirm that it was indeed a sore. I will pick up some Neosporin, and I may try the dirt quarantine approach.
 
Unfortunately, my newt passed away sometime today, and I just burried her.

As of my last post, I put her in a dirt quarantine in a cold dark closet. I took her out once a day to feed her (she wouldn't eat), and to wash the sores and apply neosporin. Within a day of putting her in the quarantine, some sores developed on her side, but after application of neosporin, they disappeared after about 2 days. This left me hopeful that she still had the energy to recover.

Unfortunately, her tail didn't seem to be healing at all. The pre-existing sore remained about the same, despite the treatment. A sore appeared more towards the tip of the tail, and it began to quickly rot off, with some of the tip coming off as I was trying to clean it with water. She then died a day or two later.

Is there much else I could have done to try to save her?
 
In my opinion, no, not unless you took the newt to a vet. There are antibiotics that might help, and force-feeding. But those are best approached with professional help. Sorry about your loss.
 
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