Frantic Pacing?

Hi all, I woke up this morning to see my leucistic male frantically running back and forth in his tank. He's been doing it all day and still hasn't stopped. He also panics when I touch him, which is VERY unusual as he is very used to being handled. His skin looks a bit reddish and inflamed, especially on his tail. I did an ammonia test and it said the water was fine, and I put him in a container with completely fresh water and he still paced and acted frantic. I did a 25% water change anyway, no difference. I can't see any sign of fungus on him at all.

He's recently been moved to a bigger tank filled to about 12 gallons (I decided not to fill it all the way since it doesn't have a top and I don't want him hopping out by chance) with a filter he's been with before, and I also had to take him to and from college which stressed him, and he lost interest in eating- I had been feeding him reptomin. However, I bought some Hikari carnivore pellets and he seemed to like those a lot and started eating again. I first fed them to him 5 days ago, and then again yesterday. I've also noticed he's been biting/snapping at the plant I put in with him. I also got new sand for the new tank- it's larger-grained than the old sand but still not nearly large enough to be called gravel. He's hand fed anyway so I don't know if he'd eat it (but it's possible.) The grains are a little sharp. However he had pooped when I got up this morning and I didn't see any grains or anything in it. I also changed the dechlorinater I was using since I ran out and the pet store I went to didn't stock any of the old kind- it's AquaSafe Plus now. However he's been on it for about a week with no problems.

I don't think temperature is a problem because our common room is quite cold as they haven't turned the heat on yet, and the water is very chilly to the touch. My thermometer broke and I can't say for certain though. And I don't know if this is consequential or not, but he bred with my female three weeks ago (the reason for the move to the different tank).

I'm completely stumped as to what to try with him, and he's been pacing for at least twelve hours. I don't want him to completely exhaust himself. If he keeps it up I might move him back to the smaller container. Please help!

He's still pacing. I'm thinking about fridging him to see if that will help, but I have no way to test the water temp without a thermometer, and no car to go get one with...

Could it possibly be from using too much dechlorinater? I always treat the water in separate 2-gallon buckets and I know I always use too much because the amount for 10 gallons is already tiny, but I've been using too much for months and they both seem fine.

You're only feeding him once every 5 days? And it's just pellets? I think he's probably hungry! Get him some earthworms and try feeding him 1/2 a worm every other day or so.

I'd agree with Kaysie - I give my axies a whole earth worm a day or every other day (if every other day they get soo hungry!).

But keep an eye out for symptoms... did you say his tail was inflamed? do you have a picture?

Normally I feed him every other day, but at that point he hadn't been eating because he was stressed from the move. Actually he still isn't eating much- he didn't eat two days ago, but he ate yesterday. The pacing has calmed down a lot, thankfully, and he's only doing it occasionally now (I think the tail was inflamed from him bashing it around). It might have just been an adjustment thing to the new tank. I'm a bit worried, because I'm going back home at the end of this week and I'll be taking them with me again, but there's not much I can do about it except try to make them as comfortable as possible in the meantime.

Also, I'm confused! I thought axolotls were only supposed to be fed once a week? I thought I was overfeeding mine by feeding them every other day (but they always seem so hungry...)