Discolored skin that turned white and now a hole

I have a young chinese fire belly newt that now has a hole in his tail. It started with a little patch that seemed discolored, a little grey, then turned to white and now it is a hole. It is one of my babies from my wild caught parents that bred before I separated the female from the male. The water parameters are good. He was with his siblings in a 55 gallon tank with lots of plants and a canister filter that did a waterfall against the glass. It is still eating well and very active.

Could it be a flesh eating bacteria and what should I do. There are no vets that deal with amphibians or lizards around where I live. I have isolated it and keep him cool.

Any ideas what it could be or where it came from. It is around a year old... Could new plants bring in bacteria? He had the discoloration start a month or more ago.

It looks like a skin sore. It's very unusual to see sores like that on captive bred newts, it's usually stressed wild caught animals that are prone to things like that.
That said, a while ago I had the same problem with one of my baby C. pyrrhogaster. I cured it with salt baths and Neosporin ointment. check out the link;

http://www.caudata.org/forum/f46-be...lp/94263-c-pyrrhogaster-illness-sickness.html

Thank for the advice. I will order some neosporin as we only have polysporin over the counter. Is it contagious for the tank mates that were with him? He is presently on moist papet towels with a hidey in a 5 gallon tank but seems to miss the water. Can i try polysporin with noo pain killer in it until I receive the neosporin? It looks like the pictures from your but without any reddness.

thank you again for the advice. I do not know why he got a sore, he is growing well and is very active. Could a pond snail or ramshorn snail caused it?

I don't know about polysporin, even neosporin is not widely available here in the UK. I used itbecause it was recommended to me. I ordered mine from ebay.com and got it shipped from over there.
Looking at the pics again, are you sure it's not an injury of some kind? the skin looks kind of pinched in around the edges as though its starting to heal, could you get a closer picture?

I will try to take better pictures tomorrow. It started over a month ago with a little patch of discoloration that then turned white and the skin got thinner until there was a hole. the whole keeps getting bigger so now it looks like a bite was taken out of the tail. He is still real active and has a great appetite. Hopefully I can get some better pictures. I may try to find a vet but it may be a 2 hour drive to get a good one.

Thank you again for all your help.

Hi mianewt, were you able to get closer pictures of the hole?

It's well worth it to get your newt to a vet if your newt is not healing. I had a newt with a wound and made quite a long drive to get it to a good herp vet whose treatment fixed the problem very quickly. You would need to keep your newt cool on the trip though. I put mine in its small enclosure in a cooler to keep it cool and calm for the long drive.

Let us know how your newt is doing...

CatSpit said:

Hi mianewt, were you able to get closer pictures of the hole?

It's well worth it to get your newt to a vet if your newt is not healing. I had a newt with a wound and made quite a long drive to get it to a good herp vet whose treatment fixed the problem very quickly. You would need to keep your newt cool on the trip though. I put mine in its small enclosure in a cooler to keep it cool and calm for the long drive.

Let us know how your newt is doing...

Click to expand...

Here's CatSpit's thread on her newt. The symptoms are very similar to yours in the beginning. I would also say get to the vets if you possibly can, these kind of sores are very often fatal if home treatment won't work. With the correct antibiotics from a vet they seem to heal up quite quickly, especially a newt that is settled and used to captivity like yours.

http://www.caudata.org/forum/f46-be...7-newt-salamander-help/101508-newt-wound.html

Hello,

my newts white spot look a lot like the ones on the newt from Cat spit's post but it is on the end of its tail and the wound looks better out of the water. I did find a vet willing to see my newt. She has treated a few axolotls but not any chinese firebelly newt but she is willing to take a look and do tests. She is a 2 hour drive away. I will not be able to go until next Saturday. His wound is not getting anyworse, I have been putting antibiotic cream on it twice a day. He is on damp paper :towels and seems to hate it. He goes swimming in his water bowl He is still very active but seems stressed to not be submerged in water. I may let him stay in water at night and on paper towels during the day???

I took some pictures a few days ago but my camera is not good for close ups so they are not very clear. It does look a bit better as there is no more white but still the hole. Hopefully it gets better or stays the same waiting for me to be able to take him to the vet. We will put the air conditioner on to make sure it stays cool and will put the container in a thermal lunchbox to help keep the temperature stable.

Thank you for all your help Cat Spit and ChinaDog. Thank you for finding the old post that look like my newts wound. I had been looking but did not see the last one.