Few Newbie Tiger Sal. Questions.

Hello all

I have just a few questions, I keep finding info, and hearing things, but it's all different, and I figured this would be the perfect place to ask!

I just got a Tiger Salamander, about 4 inches, he's a male, he's supposed to be a barred.
He has a few stripes, more like blotches lol, and I thought that would be his final color, then I saw that they get their color as they age, when does this happen?
Do they get there bars later in life? Or is mine just not going to have bars, I'll post a picture of him.

Another thing, I'm figuring he's a few months old, probably 3-5, since they morph at about 4 inches in between 2 and 5 months. Well, I was wondering how fast they grow, I'm going to measure him weekly and see how much he grows in a month, but does anyone know approx. how fast?
Like, a year to be almost full grown, 2, 3..etc?

Can they swim, or not swim? I just have a shallow water dish with rocks so he can't drown, because they are terrestrial, so I figured they couldn't swim, but then some people said they could..so yeah.

To handle, or not to handle? Some info says handle them sparingly, wash hands thoroughly, others say never handle them ever or they will die...I don't really want to handle him much now, not until he gets bigger, but I have for like..a second or two, but I washed my hands like I was getting ready to perform surgery!

Thanks for any answers!

Here's a picture.
Side view


Top view

pepper said:

Can they swim, or not swim? I just have a shallow water dish with rocks so he can't drown, because they are terrestrial, so I figured they couldn't swim, but then some people said they could..so yeah.

To handle, or not to handle? Some info says handle them sparingly, wash hands thoroughly, others say never handle them ever or they will die...I don't really want to handle him much now, not until he gets bigger, but I have for like..a second or two, but I washed my hands like I was getting ready to perform surgery!

Click to expand...

I can answer these questions for you-

Tigers seem to enjoy having a shallow water dish to lounge in occasionally; however, they are not very good swimmers and are entirely terrestrial. Go ahead and add a shallow water dish.

Salamanders don't usually 'die' from being handled, however it is still best to handle them as infrequently as possible. They are really 'enjoy watching, but don't touch' pets. Picking him up to move him during tank cleaning, etc. is fine; Taking him out and stroking him is not.

Also, if you haven't already read this, it might help- http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Ambystoma/A_tigrinum.shtml

Good Luck!

Thanks for the info, I already have a water dish in with him, I've seen him in it once, I went with the no swimming advice before I got him lol.

Yeah, I don't think I'd feel inclined to stroke him, usually when I hold my teachers, Bob, I just pick him up and he sits on my wet hand, or we wet a table and he slides around, but it's no more then maybe 5 minutes, I havn't really been holding mine at all, just because he's so darn tiny!

pepper said:

I just got a Tiger Salamander, about 4 inches, he's a male, he's supposed to be a barred.
He has a few stripes, more like blotches lol, and I thought that would be his final color, then I saw that they get their color as they age, when does this happen?
Do they get there bars later in life? Or is mine just not going to have bars, I'll post a picture of him.

Another thing, I'm figuring he's a few months old, probably 3-5, since they morph at about 4 inches in between 2 and 5 months. Well, I was wondering how fast they grow, I'm going to measure him weekly and see how much he grows in a month, but does anyone know approx. how fast?
Like, a year to be almost full grown, 2, 3..etc?

Click to expand...

Since Nathan got the other questions, I'll take these two:

For one, it may or may not be male. There's no way to tell until they're sexually mature.

The color will continue to develop as it grows.

They'll grow pretty quickly. Keep it well fed. You don't have to worry too much about overfeeding juveniles.

They said he was a male, but they could be wrong, I guess I'll have to wait, post a picture and one of you smart people can tell me

He eats about 6-9 crickets a day, it's gone up in the last day, before it was only 3-4.

I've read feed meal worms sparingly because they can compact, so I cut one in half and gave him half a little while ago.

Don't get earthworms up here until the summer, stupid Alaska.

Got anything else that would be good to feed. Right now it's size small crickets, because the big ones are almost as big as he is!

You can also use waxworms. Just make sure you dust/gutload your crickets to supply enough calcium.