Pachytriton labiatus diet

I got a Paddletail Newt a few days ago. When I got him they were just dropping newt bites in his cage. They were just sitting on the bottom. I doubt that he was eating them. I am going to my pond today to get some suds. He wont eat night crawler sections. He just looks at them, touches them with his nose and them looks away or moves away. I also tried half a regular worm and he bit at it twice and rejected that too. Mabe it was a red wiggler that tasted very bad. Will scuds or ghost shrimp work?

The red wigglers have the secretion that tastes bad I believe. Night crawlers have a secretion as well, but I usually never have any of my newts accepting them. When one does, I just wipe the cut up piece with a paper towel and try again. The will usually take it after that. I use both nightcrawlers and red wigglers (which ever is available at the store), and I make sure to cut them into small enough pieces. I have a crested newt, 2 Danube newts, 3 firebellied newts, Spanish ribbed newt, and two tiger sal. juveniles, and all of them a readily accepting of worms.

It could be that you newt is still a bit stressed from being rescued from the pet shop and being brought home. Here is a good link on food for caudates.

http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/foods.shtml

http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/worms.shtml

I think a major part of the issue here is that your newt is stressed from shipping, the pet store and all your commotion. The simplest thing to do is to just leave the newt alone in a cool, dark area for a few days. Change the water every other day or so and try leaving food items in for long periods of time. Try leaving food by the hides the newt frequents so that it doesn't need to leave a safe place to eat. I would stick with the worms for now. It may take a bit for the newt to recognize these as food items.

The approach you have now of self diagnosing problems and then applying treatment after treatment without figuring out the baseline problem is a recipe for disaster. There is plenty of time to gauge the problem, determine what is causing it and then treat it appropriately. The not eating may not be a problem. Even if it becomes a problem it is just a symptom that should be fixed by trying to figure out why it isn't eating.

Your problem is that the newt is stressed from shipping/petstore/transport. The solution is to provide it an environment that is clean (frequent water changes because your tank isn't cycled), quiet and sheltered. Provide plenty of hides, don't disturb the newt if at all possible. Avoid bright lights and loud noises and heavily trafficked areas.

Throwing dozens of different food types at it in less than 72 hours is not a plan that will usually work.

You need to remember what I told you. Some newts won't eat for a week or two after being brought home and that is perfectly acceptable. Mine never liked cut up worms so I tried them on the smallest worm I could find which were trout worms. They readily accepted it and after a year I moved to earthworms/nightcrawlers (whichever they had in stock). The female took the big guys with force while my 2 males have stayed with the trout worms.

Like Abrahm suggested, keep him in a dark, cool place for a while. I can almost guarantee that he'll come out of it when he is ready and you stop stressing.

I am not going to add scuds. I am going to the city that has my closest pet store on Thursday, if they have ghost shrimp I want to get some. Are they easy to keep? Could I put them in a small 1-3 gallon cage?

I trully don´t understand your insistence on feeding it shrimps....there are plenty of other more apropiate food items you can try. As Abrahm and others have told you, just be patient....it will eventually eat worms (all caudates love worms), if you allow the poor thing to settle down and recover from the stress, the wound, the cycling tank, which by the way you should have set up in advance. Just be patient, and give your newt a rest.