Soil

hello-
i have one tiger salamander and i was wondering how often i should change the soil in its 30 gallon tank.
thank you

Well, how often you should change the soil is dependent on how often you feed him, the more you feed him the more times a month you need to change the soil. I feed my tiger roughly once a week, with 20-30 crickets. I remove a half of the soil every month.

Note: what kind of soil are using? If you are using potting soil then it might pose a risk to the health of your salamanders because of the chemical cocktail that is included with it, and you might want to try coconut fiber instead.

i am just using potting soil and ive been using it for a long time, but it doesnt have those little styrofoam looking things in it.
thats a lot of crickets

its terribly warm where i live, so i feed him a lot more than i should.

you feed it 20-30 crickets at once?

sigh... more like 10-15

Thirst - you may want to check the container label of your potting soil. Potting soils typically contain fertilizers and other chemicals even if they do not contain vermiculite. I wouldn't use any soil that has the above in it...chemicals can be harmful. If you use soil, the best commercial product to use is topsoil without any additives. Coco-fiber sold as Bed-a-beast blocks is also a reasonable choice.

Regarding changing out soil - I tend to be conservative and change the substrate completely every 4-6 weeks with spot cleaning for poo every few days. With a 30 gallon and one tiger, you probably do not have to do it this frequently.

Myself, I am always concerned about leaving un-eaten crickets in with my tigers. Crickets can get aggresive and pick on the sals, thus I hand feed. I usually give 2-3 large crickets to adult tigers every couple of days and also nightcrawler pieces.

yea i also hand feed my salamander.

In my ambystomatid tanks, I change the soil completely once every 2 months or so. But I have more than one in every tank, so you would probably have to change less-often.