Skinny axie picture ??

Hi All

Please could someone post a pic of what they would consider a "skinny" / generally ill looking axie ?

My little guy hasn't eaten for 3 days and is generally starting to look a little thin (although I have nothing to compare him to as I can't remember what the older axies looked like at his age and I haven't had him long). First he went off worms and now I can't get him to eat bloodworm either.

At the moment I am cycling his tank so am keeping him in a shallow container with dechlorinated water (dechlorinater added rather than water left to stand). Temp is 20C. Water is changed daily (although today when I went to change his water it had a high ammonia reading of about 6 ??!). All that was in the water was an earth worm I had put in there yesterday, 2 pebbles and a very thin layer of sand so that he doesn't have to walk on bare plastic. Would the sand make a difference to the reading ?? normally I would wait till he ate THEN change the water - but I am leaving an earth worm in each day for a day to see if he eats anything and occassionally adding some blood worm just before I change his water to see if that tempts him.

For anyone who read my previous posts, he was bought from a pet shop who had kept him on gravel and he had 2 visible bumps on his sides. The bumps are no longer visible, although I haven't seen any in his original or temporary tank that he could have passed ?

I am now not sure what to do as a next step. Is it fridge time ? If so how do I acclimatise him to the temp change ? Or do I just have to put him in there ? The gravel was of a size that looked like it would be too difficult for him to pass.

I did notice today though that he was floating (just slightly above the bottom). I don't know if this was intentional or not but he was able to go back to the bottom.

I don't know what to do ...... :-(. I don't know if the gravel is still there or not, I don't know why he won't eat, and I don't know why the reading for ammonia was so high ...

Any thoughts would be appreciated ....

PS I can't get a pic up at the moment but will try later on ....

anyone ? :-(

He ate a tiny bit of daphnia yesteday. Tha's all he's eaten in about days now - although i did see his first ever poo aswell yesterday !

Oh, I wish I could help you better. But all I can say is that you are propably keeping him in too little water,so ammonia gets sky-high so quickly. I kept my axie Rosie in a small container of water(about 10 litres), and I changed half the water in the morning and half in the evening,and that wasnt enough!The ammonia was still too high. Then I made a mistake of stirring up the sand there, which must have released all the ammonia blocked inside the sand. Rosie nearly died, of ammonia poisoning. All her hair melted off, and she was limp for quite a while, even in fresh water.
So that's what I experienced. So I quess you should definately put your axie in a lot bigger container or do more water changes, evn 3 a day, I think. And don't leave the worm overnight in the tank, it will add to ammonia. Take the worm away is your axie doesn't eat in in an hour or so.

I don't know about fridge, but hopefully somebody else can help you. Good luck!

Thank you