Big changes

I just aquired a tiger salamander today after several months of endless searching. As winter set in here in alberta I began to fear I would have to wait till spring o get one. Low and behold I picked up an issue of the local bargain finder to see the aquarium selection and found a tank complete with hood light, rocks and LARGE SALAMANDER. WOOT. When I picked him up he was in a 15 gal tank with pea gravel sloped to one side with water on one end and land on the other.the only hiding spot was a sloped rock in the inch deep water end. GASP! He seems entirely healthy and boy is he big. 10-11 inches! I have redesigned his tank with gravel on one third of the side holding his water dish and the rest is coco bedding with a hiding spot under a rock with some fake and real plants. The only question I have is: He had been in the gravel bed enclosure for 2 or more years and i want to know if he will still want to burrow and dig? Any questions and comments are welcome and appreciated.

yes, it should want to dig good thing you saved it.........I whonder why people think sals should be in water, maybe its because newts usualy are

He has been in his new set up a few days now and seems to be happy. I had a smaller sized water dish in there for him but he must have gotten used to being in water because he like to take a little dip several times a day, so I added a larger dish that is half covered so he can hide if he wants. He has been showing signs of digging but he hasn't gone all out and made a full blown burrow yet. I'm glad he seems happy

my tigers frequently spend time in water...they seem to enjoy just chilling in it...then will get out and go for a stroll to their caves. What we must remember is that these guys breed in large bodies of water in the wild-so are quite capable of swimming and generally looking after themselves in the water. Providing theres plenty of land of a deep substrate level im sure its ok to have a big ater area.