quadriplegic fire belly newt

So, I'm completely a novice when dealing with newts, but I purchased two fire belly newts for my son. We fed them according to directions, frozen blood worms and have had them approximately a week. The larger newt seems to prefer the land while the smaller likes to hide on the bottom of the tank. Last night I checked on the newts and discovered the horrifying news that the larger newt is missing all four of his webbed feet to the "elbow", if you will. OMG! Do the legs regenerate or what? Should I expect to do a memorial service for this poor creature? Is this normal? Why would the smaller newt prefer his partner's feet to the frozen bloodworms? And, if he did eat the larger newts feet, how could he get to all four before the victim got away? I'm perplexed and disturbed. Help please!!!!!

Maybe your firebellies are paddle tailed newts, which are known to be a bit more agressive. if you have pics of them post it for ID, but If you do not have time for that here is a great article called" which firebelly is it"
http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/firebelly.shtml

If they are paddled tailed newts (Pachytriton) , separate them before morea damage is done if you have not already. anther article called "mixing disters" discusses the territorial aggression noted in these guys

A quadruple amputee is quite the injury. It's hard to say if the animal can rebound from something like that, but newts and salamanders have amazing regenerative abilities. All four limbs should grow back as long as he can feed as normal and is not stressed.

Definitely do what AnnMarie suggests and find out if they are firebellies or paddle-tail newts Paddle tails can be extremely aggressive and this kind of behaviour would be normal for them. The attacking newt did not want to "eat" those feet, he was defending his territory and the enemy lost all four feet because the attacker was persistent in claiming the whole tank as his territory and the enemy had no where to go.

If they are paddle-tails you should separate them immediately. If not it is possible the animals are ill and are losing their limbs to disease. This seems to be somewhat common in wild caught animals, such as firebellies, paddle-tails and basically any animal obtained from a petshop.

Also, since this is more of a Basic help topic I will be moving it to The Newt and Salamander Help Forum tomorrow.

injured newt

:talker: I looked into the descriptions and links about the differences between paddle tail and fire belly newts, and I am convinced that I do not have paddle tail newts. I did, however, follow your advice about separating the newts in the hopes that the injured newt will be able to recover. The injured newt seems very lethargic and just wants to float around the tank. As a matter of fact, I feared he was dead because he did not move, but he did move when I tried to move him. I have another question about how he was injured. Could it be possible that his legs were sucked into the tank filter? I don't think the suction is strong enough, yet I would like to consider all possibilities. I really appreciate the advice and information on the topic. If you have any other suggestions, I would gladly accept them. Thanks!!!!!! :talker:

I would move the injured(that is an understatement!)newt to shallow water with a place to get dry if it wants to. I doubt it is having an easy time moving around and it could drown. Good thing it is floating ATM but that is also a bad sign in general.

I just took the semester final for Biology and their was a question regarding an experiment with redspotted newt regeneration. According to the experiment the longer the day length was(24 vs 12 hours) the faster the newts regenerated their arms. Is this a real experiment and applicable to us, or was it made up for the test perhaps?

I had a newt that lost two front limbs at once. I put her in her own tank, mostly water and a bit of land sticking out (it was a Noto), and made it as easy for her to feed as possible. I spoiled her on blackworms. I tried to make life as non-stressful for her as possible and they grew back and she turned out OK. GOOD luck!!

hey, dawn, how long did it take her to regen?

I doubt the other fbn will have bitten them off its probably more likely to be a bacterial infection common in fbn ,if it was just one foot i would say possibly a bite but they are not normally an aggressive newt.

HI Chris,
I'm trying to remember exactly and I think it was about 1-2 months they get little tiny hands, and they grow to full-size then gradually over a period of about 2 years. I think it was about a month before the stumps looked good enough that I thought she would survive, and another month or so the very small hands, and I think I put her back in the tank with the rest of them after about 4 or 6 months. I'm sorry I can't remember any better right now.

Heather: is the newt still with you?