Illness/Sickness: not eating covered in white goo

my axle hasent eaten in probably 2 weeks i try every second day with either lamb heart, beef, bllod worms, or earth worms, and he has shown no interest in food. he is close to 20cm long (ive had him a couple of months) and he hasnt had much of a problem up untill now. there is also a lot of white furry goop building up on his skin and he has shrunk considerably.. i also have a white one in the same tank on the same diet with no problem and she would be as healthy and active as ever.. any info on what i can do would be great.. cheers

Hey there campbells,

In order for others on the forum to help you out in diagnosing the problem and finding a solution, please post a little more information on the environmental factors - including average water temp, average water flow, ammonia, pH, nitrite and nitrate levels. All of these factors can have a great influence on the health of your axolotl. While your other axolotl might seem ok - there might be problems. I have 2 axolotls and one is more sensitive to differences in water quality than the other.

Post back with some (if not all) of these details and it will make a diagnosis much easier.

-Chris

i have 2 axy's in a 3 foot tank with a suficient filter for the tank size.. the ph is at around 7 and never really changes anymore.. i dont have a test for the nitrates yet so i cant do that now.. i used to have 3 axls in total but i used to feed them live guppies by letting them just swim in the tank and the axy's would eat them when they wanted but one weekend all the guppies attacked the gills of the two smaller ones while i was away and the died over the following week i guess from strees and lack of oxygen.. the large black one was left alone but since then his appetite hasnt been the same.. i managed to get a new white axy from someone who didnt want her anymore and she has grown heaps in the past 2 weeks and her gills have almost doubled in length so it seems she is very healthy in the tank.. the tank got a leak in it just after i got the white one so there had been allot of moving around for them and fresh water changes..

Hi campbells,

My, it seems like you've been having a run of annoyances lately!

I wonder if there may be several things going on at once in your tank. If you have had the axolotls for a couple of months, it could be that the tank is in the middle of a cycle (more info here and here). An excess of ammonia/nitrite could put an axolotl off its feed and make it susceptible to a variety of other complaints.

The white fluffy stuff sounds like a fungus, but I'd hate to "diagnose" it as such without photos - can you provide a picture or two? Fungus can grow on an axolotl under a variety of circumstances (especially on an injury) and is more likely at warmer temperatures. What temp is the water in your tank?

I keep guppies in my tanks, too, and have never known them to bite a healthy axolotl, but if the axolotl has an injury, the guppies will nip and nip at it, even down to the bone. Could your axolotls have injured each other? This is not uncommon, particularly if the axolotls are young, hungry, or do not have enough places to hide from each other.

As to the leak (I live in dread of having one, you poor thing) - did you repair the leak with some sort of epoxy or silicone and reuse the tank or did you chuck it and get a new one? If you repired the tank and put the axolotl back into it, perhaps there is some chemical in the glue that is leaching into the water?

Lastly, moving the axolotl a lot can cause stress on its own. Not eating is a common response in this case - but it wouldn't directly explain the white goo.

Hopefully we can quickly narrow down to what is going on.

-Eva

thankyou eva,
i dont have a nitrate test kit but i will definatly go get one tomorow.. i went to take photo's of axle today but he didnt really have that goo at the moment so they wouldnt be much help.. it looked like a fine white goo which i though may be just excretion because i read somewhere that axlotyls excrete from there skin instead of "pooping"..

reguarding the water temperature i got this tank in the middle of summer and i was always worrying about the temperature.. but there was never a problem with feeding.. and now its getting allot colder so im not sure if that could be it but i will get a thermometer when i get the nitrate test and find out exactly..

when i had the leak i removed everything from the tank and put both in a smaller backup tank i have.. there didnt seem to be much of a problem with both in there together.. i fixed the leak myself with aquarium silicone and left it 3 days before filling with water then another day filled.. then i washed tank again and filled with fresh water.. the only thing i rushed was i didnt get the chance to cycle the tank before i put them in beacuse i found axle floating in the small tank and it seemed like he was in need of some room for himself..

the main thing that i can think of is that there is a new 4 year old axlotyl in the tank from a friends and she has gone through everything from the tank leak, with all the water changes and the moving from house.. with all that stress on both of them the new one has acually grown, her gill-thingy's have almost doubled in size and she is extremely active..

thanks again for the help i will read the links

campbells

just for a update

i have been reading alot about other problems on the forums and have decided to fridge axle too keep him away from stumpy.. let him "chill" out for a while and try to rejuvenate..
fingers crossed thankyou for everyones help with this its greatly appreciated..

campbells