Ammonia probs among others

Hi!

I've been avidly reading this forum trying to get my little guys a good home but am experiencing a few problems.

My main one is the ammonia levels. I've been doing water changes every day to try and keep it under control, it's getting better but not perfect, the levels are sitting at 0.50 with 0 nitrate and 0 nitrite, neutral pH levels.

I've just pulled the majority of my weed out of the tank because it wasn't fairing well and was concerned that the decay was upping the ammonia levels (is this right?)

My two older axies have lost alot of their gills and come up to the surface alot to breathe, i'm assuming that this was from being burnt from the ammonia levels in the past before i realised that it was a serious problem.

They are both eating well, but i'm concerned about the ammonia level, should they be taken out of the tank and stuck in the fridge till my tank sorts it's self out?

Are their gills going to regenerate? if so, how long should that generally take? they had massive ones when i originally got them.

Originally the temperature in my tank was rather high, avg 24, 26 on the hotter days (i'm in Australia and dreading summer) but have gotten the water down to a constant 20 degrees by the use of a fan.

My black one however did suffer from heat stress and went a bit grey and stopped eating, now it seems to be ok and he's ravenous.

Between the heat and the ammonia, i think it's pritty obvious as to why they got ill in the first place.

Could someone please tell me whether i'm doing the right thing, or whether i can do any thing more to help improve their quality of life?

Thanks!

ok first of all was your tank cycled? im guessing it wasnt because otherwise you wouldnt have ammonia spikes (or shouldnt in a established tank).
first of all you need to stop the water changes as this will slow down cycling. put some food or axie poop in there and leave it be. test weekly to see your readings. ammonia will spike and drop, then the same with the nitrites and finally nitrate will register (i think the ideal is 20ppm, cant remember sorry).
in the meantime take your axies out of the tank and place them in a bucket or in the fridge, changing all the water daily- make sure its the same temp though.
if you have access to established filters or substrate you can add that to the tank to help it along.
if you have any more questions please ask, we are more than happy to help

I've had the tank almost 2 months now, a couple of weeks ago i made the mistake of cleaning my filter thanks to the "helpful" advice of my local pet shop which i've now come to understand has killed all the good bacteria as i had the ammonia levels down to 0.

My water changes have dramatically dropped the ammonia levels which were at 4 (eek i know) and they seem to back to 0.5

I'm going put them in the fridge at your suggestion Sharn.

Any idea on whether or how long the gills will grow back?

Cleaning the filter shouldn't have caused the tank's bacteria population to crash by itself unless there was something else going on in the tank. Filter maintenance is part of the normal aquarium care routine.
The density of the bacteria that converts ammonia to nitrite to nitrate may be higher in the filter but it also colonizes all of the other surfaces in the tank which is why a cleaned filter is rapidly recolonized.
Having a tank set-up for two months doesn't necessarily mean that the tank was cycled as depending on conditions, up to 90 days are not that uncommon.
The plants dying back would contribute to the ammonia problem but the decomposition would also reduce the oxygen available to the axolotls causing them to surface to breath.

How often and how much are you feeding them as overfeeding is another typical cause of high ammonia levels in early tank setup.

Ed

Thanks for your help guys, much appreciated.

I'm feeding them 1 to 2 small tubifex worm cubes a day (one in the morning, one in the evening)and a piece of freeze dried shrimp (using tongs) if they want something extra. If they're not hungry they just turn their head and ignore me. Any excess food is taken out so that it doesn't go off.

I should mention they're fully grown btw, if that food seems excessive.

When the ammonia went nuts they both wouldn't eat.

Is the isolation in the fridge for the time being still the best solution and just let my tank cycle and sort it's self out?

At your temperatures, I personally would probably feed them about three times a week as opposed to daily but this would also be subject to how the animal looked (if it looked like it needed to have more food offered).

I personally tend to avoid small freeze dried or frozen foods with larger animals like this due to the amount of particulate material that is lost during the feeding process. If possible I would suggest switching to earthworms or some of the pelleted foods supplemented by the other items for variety as opposed to using them for the entire diet.

with respect to the cycling you may want to review http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/cyclingEDK.shtml

Well you have two options as suggested above, you can use the bucket method outside the fridge if you can keep it cool enough or if you can't then it can be placed in the fridge.

Ed

Ok, i'll cut the food back a bit and see if that helps and stick them in the fridge while the tank sorts it's self out.

I've had a few issues with food, i've tried bloodworms (live and frozen), pellets and feeder fish and none of them would eat them.

Which is why i switched to the cubes and the shrimp because they love them. The pellets no matter how many times you drop them in front of their faces they won't eat.

Any way, thanks for all your help again, i'll keep you posted on how the little guys and the tank fair

sin sister - Freeze dried tubifex isn't very nutritious.

I would encourage you to keep trying different foods until they accept some of them, so you can add more of a variety to their diet.

You might try a sliver of fresh raw fish, or fresh raw prawn or shrimp, and live crickets.

Oh and welcome to the forum If you haven't found it already, I would also suggest you check out http://axolotl.org/

thanks cynthia, i've gotten some prawns to see how they go down, they don't seem very interested in food since i've stuck them in the fridge which is understandable from the change in temperature and environment.

one question however, how often do they tend to eat when they are in the fridge? i'd just like to know what's normal and what's not.

thanks.

well i'm happy to report after stealing some water from my better half's aquarium and watching the ammonia, nitrites and nitrates bounce around, they finally seem to have sorted themselves out. The plants look a hell of a lot happier now.

I've re-introduced Yin, my white albino back into the tank to see how he finds the changes, my other guys are still in the fridge. I'm still a bit reluctant to put them back in with the temperature the way it is and if Yin gets stressed I'll be putting him back in the fridge.

They absolutely love the prawns cynthia so thanks for that advice

I feel like going down to my pet store and writing the link to this forum on the axolotl tank as a matter of public service now.

sin sister - When they are ready, add the axolotls back to the tank slowly, like one every 10 days or so. If you add them all at once your ammonia levels could rise again. Test your tank water daily while you are reintroducing them to the tank.

Glad they are eating, keep trying new foods until they have a nice variety in their diet.

hey sin sister thats a good idea.. wonder if you get in trouble for writing on their tanks... id do that to our bigger LFS- theyre the money loving type. generally they have no assistants in their fish part... twink might be a goer. and no im not a vandal lol, their axies are kept on gravel with a strong filter and food rotting in their tank :S

urgh tell me about it Sharn, one of my guys was full of pebbles which i only found out about through putting them in the fridge.

They don't make any suggestions on how to care for them other than feed them pellets.

This forum has been invaluable.

Sin Sister,hi. Which pellets are you feeding your axy?

I tried feeding them axolotl pellets by aquarium science and a different brand that my partner uses for his. I've given up on them since they seem to be doing well on the other foods now

and more good news, ammonia, nitrates and nitrites are all at zero and holding plus Yin is starting to grow his gills back, he's got little tiny feathers starting to appear on him again which i'm so thrilled about, it will be interesting to see how much they grow back because he had a beautiful set before all of this.

nitrates at zero?

With live plants, you may not necessarily have any nitrate levels.