Best colours?

I am going to be ordering 2 axies in june from Wardsci canada through my college, which will drop the shipping cost (they do a large order yearly) Obviously i will have no idea what genetics i will be getting, only the dominant colour variation. So i suppose the question is, what would be the best colour variation that is likely to yeild the most variety in young? i hope to get a breeding pair and would like to get a nice variety of young

i would probably say that if a white one and a black one mate it will come up with a handfull of different colours

If you plan on breeding them, then two wildtypes have the highest probability of being heterozygous for the various color variations.

Now for my general spiel about why you shouldn't breed your axolotls. It's exceedingly time consuming. Daily water changes, constant feedings, poop removal, and you have to keep the sizes in separate tanks. This means you may be maintaining 20 tubs or more. And it's expensive. Buying (or hatching) a constant supply of tiny live food can really rack up the dollars. And what do you plan to do with all the young? Are you going to raise all 200 of them? Do you have 200 homes to give them to? It took me almost 8 months to get rid of 6 offspring. Just 6. And that's after I even kept two of them.

i will have no problems finding homes, i will probably only successfully raise a small number, i have a python hose and am on well water that needs no dechlorinator

not to mention when they start they dont often stop and you can wear your female out, if they start you will have to keep them apart either by divider or a seperate tank to give her some time to get ready again.

ive been keeping axies for a few years now and even i dont want to attempt breeding, too much time that i dont have and a whole lot of effort. id suggest only raising ten, once you get rid of them let them breed again etc, you dont want to have 6 left over from your last batch and have another 200 babies pop up! of course culling is an option too so i suggest you look into various methods because you will alot on your hands.

also- having 2 doesnt mean you will get babies, im not sure if you will know the sex before hand? they would have to be a pretty decent size to tell. i have 1 female and 3 males in a tank, all mature, and they have been together for a year or two now and they havent done anything, its more luck when it comes to breeding axies. theyre not like mice where you can put them together and bam! babies for africa lol.

sorry i cant help you on the colours, pretty hard to determine unless you know the history, think of it as a surprise lol
good luck on your quest for axies and babies

(Message edited by sharn on March 23, 2006)

if they don't make babies I don't really care, I will ask for a male and female if they can tell, but otherwise im not too concerned. I also have fish so I have many tanks which are not in use.