Bad stage in juveniles' lives

As many of you know, I became the unexpected owner of 50+ C.orientalis when my pair had offspring 2 years ago. A few were lost as larvae, a few more as juveniles, and one when adapting to the aquatic stage. However, over the past 3 weeks, I've lost 10 juveniles in the terrestrial stage. I have no idea what's going on. A dozen of my babies have moved to the water, so I now have 3 tanks for aquatic newts, two for terrestrial. Are they overcrowded - have about a dozen in each 10 gallon tank? I did have a spinal cord injury in Aug. and it is why I've been missing here, so tanks weren't getting cleaned out quite as regularly as before, but nothing too bad. The substrate is paper towels and a mixture of java moss and fake plants and hides. They seem to be eating unless some are being outcompeted now that they're in closer quarters. One is dying - looks very weak, but not particularly skinny or anything.

Dana

Are the ones dieing the smallest? I'm guessing that the ones now aquatic are much larger by now. Some of the ones on land are perhaps not getting as much to eat as some of the others and/or are too wet. Have you tried using a soil-type substrate at all?

Not all have been the smallest, Jen, but one today was though the one who was on his way out (and since passed on) looked to be a good size. It's very frustrating and I can't determine any causes of death - temp is stable, no other changes. The boys say the deaths have been spread out more over the course of 6 weeks, but it's still a lot considering the very rare deaths over the past 2 years with this bunch.

I've only once, at the very beginning, used a coco fiber substrate but then read about a death from another poster when the coco fiber was possibly ingested. Since then, it's been moist paper towels with lots of hides. Some tanks have had water bowls though the current set ups do not have them.

I think I'll split them up - actually cleaned out the tank after posting and put some of the larger into the aquatic tanks to see how they do, so this particular terrestrial tank isn't so crowded.

Dana

Those sound like sensible approaches. Any of them that adapt to water will probably be fine. Beyond that, the only suggestions I would have would be to try other foods (I don't know what you are using) or try a drier setup with a soil-type substrate (I use this for all my terrestrials and have never had a problem).

Maybe I will return to the cocofiber. I always worry about dehydration and ingestion of foreign material, but one death did seem to result in the newt being trapped between the layers of paper towels. I'm not sure if it was the cause, or just where I found it.

Yes, to answer your previous question, the aquatic ones are looking much larger. A couple of them look very close to full grown and eat very well to the point where they've got their own tank as they'd intimidate smaller ones from eating. The first eggs hatched 2 years ago, morphed beginning in June of '09 and for the next 6 months or so.

Thanks again - hope all is well with your brood. I hope to be back from now on!
Dana

There are other options other than coco-fibre. There is a good article about soil substrates here:

Caudata Culture Articles - Vivarium Substrates

I suspect that changing to a non-paper substrate will help, as other people have reported losses of some efts kept on paper towels. The other option is to provide stacks of hides, so the newts can climb up an away from the wet towels when they want to, and also to lift the tank at one end and spray only at the lower end unless absolutely necessary, so one end is drier than the other (although the wicking action of the towels will undo this to a certain extent).

I hope you manage to get on top of the problem

C

Thanks for the input. Their diet has been wingless fruit flies, springtails, sometimes earthworms. I dust food w/ calcium. I didn't realize the wetness could be some of the problem. I figured dehydration would be the bigger concern. Do you keep a water bowl in your set-ups then? Some of mine have bowls, others do not. I had once used the tilted tanks but it was more for those going from the larvae stage to terrestrial.

Thanks again,
Dana

I keep water dishes in my terrestrial Cynops setups, but they are rarely used. As long as the soil is even just slightly damp, this is enough.