New T. shanjing not eating

I bought two T. shanjing at a reptile expo in mid November, and they haven't eaten anything!!! I've read all the other posts about this species, and I don't know where I'm going wrong. They probably are wild caught animals and I feel bad about that now.
They don't have any external problems, and they look like a healthy size. They move about a little bit at night.
They have refused small crickets and small waxworms repeatedly.
I have them in a 10 gallon tank with a gravel layer on the bottom and a mixed top substrate layer of cocoa fiber, reptibark, and sphagnum moss. I arranged little piles of each substrate separately and they choose the reptibark most often. They have a little hide cave and a shallow water dish that never get used. The temperature varies from 55-60'F. I'm not sure of the humidity level, but I'm sure it's over 65% and under 85%.
What can I do to make them happy?

I sort of have exactly that same problem. I was given a small T. shanjing on 11-14 that I think was also wc, but you can't say no to a gift. It was chubby when I got it, with what looks like one small healing sore. I couldn't get it to eat anything from forceps. Then I put in a very shallow bowl of blackworms and though I never see it eat, it hasn't lost any weight and is still alive, so I think it must be eating them. It is not friendly or interactive at all like my to cb Tylos, but is getting a little bit better, and with patience and time, I'm hoping it'll relax. It used to close its eyes tight and play dead whenever I came near it or offered it anything, but now it's sometimes keeping its eyes open and acting alive. Here's the setup. It's a 5 gallon tank, and the newt is in its little house.

Do you think they might be in some sort of "hibernation" mode? I do notice that they shy away when they see me looking in at them, so maybe they're still stressed out from capture and shipment (assuming they are WC)? I hope it isn't parasites or some sort of irreversible physiological damage. I don't want to bother them too much, but it really worries me that they aren't eating. And again, they don't look too skinny or too fat.

Thanks so much for the photo; it makes me feel better about what I've created for them because your set-up looks a lot like mine! I even have the same water dish and tree stump (I bought two!)... I don't have that little bridge, but would you believe I have picked it up and looked at it a couple of times?!

What do your CB guys like eating? How much and how often do you feed them?

Firstly, this should be in the newt and salamander help section, not the species discussion topics.

You say it won't eat but you won't say what you're trying to feed it. In my experience wild caught Tylototriton shanjing may not adapt to being fed from a forceps quickly (or at all, depending on your persistence). In my experience if you get some nice fresh live waxworms and put a few in the tank with it late at night and then leave it in peace it will eat when you're not around.

A friend of mine had this problem with one of his shanjings. It eventually went mad for bloodworms. Mine like earthworms and butterworms too.

Ok, I've moved the thread to the help section.

I did try exactly that with the waxworms, left a couple, and it didn't eat them. I tried a few times, and silk worms too. But I'm sure it's eating, since it's been 1 1/2 months and it still looks plumpish, and not at all smaller. I will just keep trying and hope that eventually it'll get used to me.

My cb ones, I feed twice a week, mostly with worms. In the summer I gave them whole worms from my garden which they would suck up like spaghetti, but for the winter, I'm feeding cut nightcrawlers, cut small. They don't seem to be as crazy about them as my garden worms.
I also treat them with slugs, which they love more than anything in the world, I think. But I find few in the winter, but any day it's a bit warm, I go out and look, and I've found a few.
I also treat them with waxworms, and an occasional silkworm. I'm going to try pillbugs this coming spring.

Oh, I've also put fruit flies in the tank. They disappear after a couple of days, so I'm hoping they're getting eaten as well.

And for my next trick, I'm going to start culturing whiteworms, and see how everyone likes them.

Even experienced hobbyists will vary in their husbandry techniques so with that being said I would keep the animal(s) in a simple setup with a shallow dish of water, damp paper towel substrate, and a shallow, inverted plastic lid with a hole cut in it for a hide. This way you could see right away if any food has been leftover (instead of hiding). Once it has been established that everything is eating well then I would switch over to a more complicated design. In addition to the advice already given you might want to try small earthworms. A fairly recent T. taliangensis import that I have initially refused everything offered, including cut sections of larger earthworms. I tried a very small earthworm and it was immediately consumed. I may have just been lucky but perhaps the smaller eartworm seemed more like prey. Just some thoughts.
Chip

Thanks, everybody! I will try all of your suggestions.
Sorry for posting in the wrong area.

My shanjing were very picky and touchy when I first got them. They were not good eaters. In fact, they just about died 2 years ago at about this time.It's been my experience that too wet is a lot worse than a bit too dry for this species.Obviously, they need moisture, but the winter humidity shouldn't be too high. They do seem to get a bit more dormant in the winter. I also gave them a larger tank with more room. This seemed to give the shanjing more options to go to a wetter or drier area.

My two are more active now,eat like pigs and are really tame..but they took a long time to get that way.

Be patient and try lot of different live foods. Small garden worms are the best for picky eaters. I have mine eating meal worms these days, so they are really domesticated.

i have a breeding group of ten which i'm keeping cool just now, they seem to be more active and feed better when the temps rise to around 70 so if you are worried you could try raising the temp and see if this helps.

freves said:

Even experienced hobbyists will vary in their husbandry techniques so with that being said I would keep the animal(s) in a simple setup with a shallow dish of water, damp paper towel substrate, and a shallow, inverted plastic lid with a hole cut in it for a hide. This way you could see right away if any food has been leftover (instead of hiding). Once it has been established that everything is eating well then I would switch over to a more complicated design. In addition to the advice already given you might want to try small earthworms. A fairly recent T. taliangensis import that I have initially refused everything offered, including cut sections of larger earthworms. I tried a very small earthworm and it was immediately consumed. I may have just been lucky but perhaps the smaller eartworm seemed more like prey. Just some thoughts.
Chip

Click to expand...

This is the exact method i used to get my shanjings to eat. It took a long while, around two months before they started eating but once they did they did not stop.

Hello,

Not adding much thats new here but I would just like to echo a couple of points that have already been made as I have a fair amount of experience with these newts including difficult wild caught adults.

When feeding them, it helps to disturb them as little as possible. Evening time is best. With difficult wild caught newts sudden movements or hitting them on the nose with the food ends the game and you need generally need to leave them and try again later. You'll probably also notice that if they take a snap at a prey item, they often refuse to try again. Again, just try again later. As they get used to feeding they become more likely to have a second shot at missed prey. They also get quite tame and much less nervous.

Earthworms of an appropriate size are useful - "wild" ones and Lumbricus species are better than bait species (Dendrobaena etc). Too large and lively and I find nervous animals just back away but equally they don't seem to react to tiny worms. With waxmoth larvae my own personal observations have been that some picky newts would not eat "older" waxworms that have been around a while or have begun to change colour. Sometimes "fresher" waxies will be taken more enthusiastically.

Thawed frozen bloodworm really, really smells! When one of my wc adult females would not eat anything she began to take those from a stick. This particular individual was extremely annoying and would only eat bloodworm, backing away from any live prey. What you can then do is incorporate worm segments, small worms or waxmoth larvae into the bloodworm, gradually reducing the bloodworm until the newt is back eating "normal" prey items. Said newt is now huge, eats well and has mated and produced offspring for the past two years.

As has already been said, temperature is an issue and the newts will have a larger appetite when warmer. I currently keep two lots of juveniles the same age in different places and the ones that are warmer generally eat more. Again, as has been said this species prefers it drier, however there must be adequately moist areas as well. In my own experience, my wc adults are more difficult to feed when their tank dries out. Refreshing the substrate can help increase their appetite i've found.

Finally, its always a decent idea to leave some sort of live food in the tank, under cover. Often picky newts will choose to eat nocturnally out of sight.

Captive bred offspring that have been getting hand fed since they were larvae and small juveniles rarely have any problems with feeding once large enough and become exceedingly tame. Wild caught adults in my experience, dont seem to become quite as good but do improve massively and become reasonably tame with enough time and patience!

Best of luck!

YAY!!!! They both ate!!!!
I put them in a simple habitat with only wet paper towel and one hide.
I placed this new habitat in a slightly warmer location.
At night, I added two small waxworms and two small pieces of earthworm in each habitat.
In the morning, the food items were gone!
I don't know why I didn't think of doing that earlier...
THANK YOU, CAUDATA FRIENDS!!!

and..

Also,,, If you're feeding live bloodworms on paper towel, sometimes they have to be individually seperated or the newts won't take them. And if the worms dry out a quick spray will bring them back to life and they will move and be eaten.