Question: New to forum - An introduction and a couple of questions - Freeze dried Crickets for Axolotls

Hi everyone,

Dean and Sara here in Auckland New Zealand.

This is our first post but have been reading this great forum for a while now.

We have had Dee Dee (named after Dee Dee Ramone) our axie for just over a year now.

He is in a 36" x 15" x 15" tank which he shares with three White Cloud Mountain Minnows. The original Minnow we bought him as treat to eat but Dee Dee totally wasn't interested in eating it. After a couple of weeks the poor little Minnow was looking a bit lonely so we went back to the shop and bought two more minnows to keep the original Minnow company. The Minows immediately formed a shoal and have been happily co-existing with Dee Dee ever since.... He never ever bothers them and they happily swim right in front of his face no problem!

Ok here's our question...

Has anyone any experience feeding freeze dried crickets to Axies?

We bought a can of Fluckers brand freeze dried shrimp and have been feeding Dee Dee a shrimp or two every so often but were wondering if they are actually ok for him to eat? He seems to spend quite a bit f time trying to swallow them. Today he threw them all back up which he has never done before.

His normal feeding schedule is to be fed twice a week with frozen "Axolotl food" which we buy from our local pet shop. This food seems to be a mash of insects, meat and veges. As it's now summer we also catch a few flies in the garden and feed his a few of those as treats.


Also we are not sure if we are feeding him enough.

As I said we have had him for 13 months and he has doubled in size and is now probably about 7 1/2 inches long. Does this growth rate seem about right or should he be bigger after a year?

We have constructed a feeding pen for him which we lower into his tank at feeding time made from a baby fish breeing pen. He can easily walk or swim into the pen and make as much mess as he wants and then we just lift out the pen when he's finished eating removing any uneaten scraps so as to not pollute the tank.

Each feeding session lasts about 5 minutes.

Does this all sound ok?

Thanking any forum members is advance for any help or advice.

Attaching a couple of photos of Dee Dee

Thanks,

Dean & Sara - Auckland New Zealand

That feeding pen is a great idea and will save you a lot of time cleaning. As for his size all axolotls grow at different rates. My axolotl is the same age as yours and roughly the same size. I wouldn't feed freeze dried shrimp as a staple diet. They are fine as a treat every few weeks. For my axie the staple diet is earth worms, bloodworms and trout pellets. Hope this has helped. Also those minnows must be the luckiest fish alive!

Welcome!

I also have white clouds with my axies. I'm not sure if any of them are ever eaten, but they are generally too fast to be eaten.

All sounds good. Axies will regurgitate if they eat too much, just be sure not to feed that quantity.

How do you keep the tank so clean? It almost looks TOO clean.

I never worry about feeding live crickets to Axolotls but I would be afraid of the freeze dried ones being to hard do to the lack of moisture in them. I would be afaid they would have trouble swollowing and digesting them. Think of it like this... a nice juicy steak goes down easy. That piece of dried beef jerky might choke you if you don't chew it up well. Plus these crickets are probally not gut loaded before freezing and their nutritional value might be a little suspect. Almost 8 inches sounds to be a good size for a year old Axie. 8 to 12 inches is normal for an adult. Your Axie probally has a couple more inches left in him.Your feeding pen is a great idea and probally why your tank is so clean. I have to say what a great job picking the correct stone for him. So many people just can't grasp the idea of small gravel being harmful to their animals when they eat it. Thanks for shareing your pictures with us. Keep us up to date as he grows

I have often wondered if the freeze drying process affects the nutritional value of crickets the same way canning them does. I would suspect the necessity of rehydrating them before use would leach out quite a bit of the "good stuff".

I make this assumption only because of the cell wall destruction caused by the freezing followed by the removal of ice crystals and subsequent air drying would in theory effectively remove most of the food value.

Hey thanks so much for all of your responses... very much appreciated!

To answer a couple of points:

I myself suspect the dried Shrimps are too dry and hard to digest so may stop feeding him these or just give him one as an ocassional Scooby snack.

Yes the tank does look very clean and stays pretty clean as it's a big tank with very few inhabitants. The feeding pen also helps hugely in keeping the tank clean. Also I think the white quartz substrate gives it a clean look.

Thanks for the positive response on the feeding pen, I'm attaching a few photos. This is our work in progress pen (it's just a baby fish rearing pen from the pet shop) we are designing and making a more elegant one currently. I will upload photos when it's finished. Yes the pen works really well and no uneaten food ever remains in the tank.

This is Dee Dee's new tank, the old one was less than half this size. We had this tank and steel stand custom made about 6 months ago. I have been doing 30 litre water changes roughly every week. But now after some experimentation, and not changing the water for over 3 weeks but carefully monitoring all levels, I have found that after 3 weeks all levels, Nitrate, Nitrite, Ammonia all still read at their lowest levels. We use the API master test kit.

Attaching a few photos taken last night at feeding time and today after a tank clean and put his old (fake) log back in the tank.

Great forum, cool people!

Dean & Sara

PS. For some reason all of the photos got corrupted on the upload... sorry! Any ideas why?

Photo upload - 2nd attempt

Ok lets try uploading those photos again.

Possible pilot error

OK FOR SOME REASON MY PHOTOS KEEP GETTING CORRUPTED ON THE UPLOAD!

Hi,

Your stones look a bit worrying i think he might be able to swallow one because they are about same size as his head. You will be surprised how big a stone they can swallow.

I agree with scrappa. The stone look like they could end up wedged in the mouth at some point especially if he grows anymore.
The tank does look seriously gorgeous though!!

Mel