Want to know what I did wrong!

My last attempt at raising larvae was a failure. I want to know what I did wrong, because I want to raise many more in the future. So here is exactly how I did it: I had around 70 larvae in the beginning. Kept in a 14 in x 8 in x 6 in plastic bin with the water around an inch high. I sucked up brine shrimp from hatchery via turkey baster, put those in a shrimp net, and fed to larvae. Fed every day. Around 5-7 hours after fed, I changed their water by sucking up all the larvae in the turkey baster and putting them into another identical bin. Temperature was maintained at 57-59 F. (This is because my house is at a cold temperature, around 65 F.)
Is there anything described here that I may have not done right?
Note: I have confirmed that all my losses were not because of the fact that the mother is young. I talked to one of my customers who bought eggs from the same batch and they said they had a very high survival rate.
Please help, I want to be successful in the future.

Did you rinse the bbs as well as just get rid of the salt water?

I really cant see what your doing wrong here, but maybe try a lot less next time so lots of larvae dont die and you have more time to concentrate on them. like in chinese takeaway tubs x

I agree with sheena - next time try fewer larvae, and in several containers. If there were a significant number of uneaten BBS, I would also recommend feeding less.

When deciding how many to raise, remember that mortality is usually all-or-nothing. Either they nearly all survive, or they all die. How would you have dealt with 70 if they had all lived? How many tubs would they require by the time they are an inch long?

What was the pattern of the death rate? In other words, did they die one-by-one a few every day? Or did one die, then 5 the next day, then 40 the next day? The latter kind of pattern is roughly exponential (how's your math?) and this tends to indicate an infection/epidemic.

Jennewt said:

I agree with sheena - next time try fewer larvae, and in several containers. If there were a significant number of uneaten BBS, I would also recommend feeding less.

When deciding how many to raise, remember that mortality is usually all-or-nothing. Either they nearly all survive, or they all die. How would you have dealt with 70 if they had all lived? How many tubs would they require by the time they are an inch long?

What was the pattern of the death rate? In other words, did they die one-by-one a few every day? Or did one die, then 5 the next day, then 40 the next day? The latter kind of pattern is roughly exponential (how's your math?) and this tends to indicate an infection/epidemic.

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Okay, I will only attempt raising 20-25 this time. There was quite a large number of uneaten BBS. The pattern was: First day deaths began, 15. Then 5 next day. Then 2-4 deaths every day, until there was none left. No, I did not rinse the BBS.

Have to go along with the rest and say less is more,
I had 21 live hatches, one had to be euthernased, started with 3 in a take away container and within a week I put them all in there own individual containers.

With my bbs I turkey baste a load into a net then put through at least 2 if not 3 lots of fresh declorinated water, and then tip the lot into a small amount of fresh declorinated water, this water I then use to feed the babies. I let it sit for an hour to two hours then I remove all uneaten bbs and water and put all the babies in a new tub with fresh aged declorinated water. It's actully quite quick it's just the hour or two in between.

I haven't left the bbs any longer than that.

They all seem fine, eating and poohing regularly, and the added bonus is if any of them do get anything it's not passed to the others.

Though what I'm gonna do with twenty babies is beyond me..

I will do exactly as you guys say. I'll buy more bins to space them out better, only raise a small amount, and rinse the BBS very well.
I hope this works, I want to be successful...

You said that you move them everyday that is another factor that will stress out the baby axolotls and cause them to die. I suggest just changing the water without moving them everyday.

How would that be possible?

You guys will probably really disagree with using nets to get them out but for some reason finding a turkey baster in the shops has been impossible.

So i started off netting each one out because i only had the one net lots of bbs and daphnia got in the net, there was literally no point in cleaning them the water was just as dirty.

Then i got a bigger net which everything falls through but the axolotl larvae so it was all really clean could just tip the water gently and all the poo and yuck fell through and axolotls were kept, been doing this for a while now and they are all thriving over 200 of the little things!

So in my opinion this is less stressful for the babies because its literally from one container to the rest no messing around no chasing babies round the tub

I dont have many die now, but at the beginning i did have about 10-15 mutated ones which did die, but as jennewt said most should survive

some tubs will do, no need for big bins you can use a turkey baster or a net. And if you are unsure on what they are eating you can keep track with smaller numbers and maybe try putting a little bit of BBS in see if its being eaten and then you can always add more

I have had a nightmare with my bbs lately so have gone on to daphnia and I found BBS a very dirty food after it had been in the water long and it all clumped up, but with the dapnia even though less nutritious i can put lots in the water with no need to worry as they stay alive, and then feed them to my fish later if they are uneaten.

It is hard trying to raise larvae in large numbers, I have over 200 (need to count them), and its been a struggle but ive had my mum and bf putting their bit in when they can, so dont put yourself down for it, it is very hard and I DEFINITELY know next time ill select about 20-50 eggs rather then the large amount I have.

So when they start growing bigger its going to be a nightmare, but id like to know i could just chuck in some bloodworm and it would be okay, rather then filter out small and large daphnia and BBS which are majorly smelly after a while

Best of luck if you ever need any help with raising larvae let me know, I'm not an expert but always willing to help where I can understand how upsetting and frustrating it must be for you! Best of luck! xx

Common sense if you move your axolotl every day they will become stress and die....

Psychopathic963 said:

How would that be possible?

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I think the question is how would it be possible to change the water without moving axolotls. Common sense would tell you that in order to give the axolotls fresh water they would have to be moved into it, you can't drain a tank and leave them with no water.

920fish said:

Common sense if you move your axolotl every day they will become stress and die....

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I disagree. I have raised larvae with total water changes, moving them to a clean container daily. It's not the best method, but it does work.

What is the best method? The best is to have a pre-cycled planted tank ready when the eggs hatch. This would be a healthy tank with a nice growth of algae and micro-organisms. Unfortunately, most people don't have a nice well-established tank sitting empty and waiting for larvae.

danchristopher said:

I think the question is how would it be possible to change the water without moving axolotls. Common sense would tell you that in order to give the axolotls fresh water they would have to be moved into it, you can't drain a tank and leave them with no water.

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Lol damn ur funny as hell. Common sense is you can change the water without moving them just use a turkey baster......... Who says you need to drain the tank bare to make sure the water is fresh lmao.... u just need to change the water......

920fish said:

Lol damn ur funny as hell. Common sense is you can change the water without moving them just use a turkey baster......... Who says you need to drain the tank bare to make sure the water is fresh lmao.... u just need to change the water......

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Ummm. What?
He was raising larvae in an uncycled tub - like many people do on these forums. I did it the same way and moved my larvae everyday to new water and had a 100% survival rate. Several people on Caudata have used similar methods and had their larvae survive just fine.

There are a whole range of random factors that we should consider when it comes to why his larvae died. I'm pretty sure I've read threads about axies dying because the water board decided to dump a whole bunch more chlorine in the water than normal.
In fact, here is an entire article about the different reasons larvae die: Caudata Culture Articles - Why Larvae Die

Amen Dan, right now I have over 200 larvea and they are getting daily water changes. I move them to a fresh container with a turkey baster and have only lost 3 mutants <which wouldn't have made it anyhow> so far. I feed them off two different daphnia cultures that I have going. I think that a lot of it has to do with making sure that the water is treated and aged properly and not "power squirting" the baby axxies into the next container. As well as paying close attention to water temp.

Everything I know about raising axolotls I learned on this board...

I've also done the "99%" water changes, sucking most of the water out with a turkey baster and then adding fresh. I move them to a fresh tub every couple of days just so I can wash the 'slime' out.

I do the same (in fact I think it was kaysie, that told me how ) and 99% of mine are still here and are getting there back legs. I don't actully turkey baste them over as most are too big. But they do get transferred most days, and defiantly have a water change every day.

I have them in individual containers and as a curiosity I did an ammonia test on one of the babies water, it was about 2 past it's water change and had pooped well, it was <25% but heading that way, so how else would you keep them without doing a water change at least daily..

Oh and I'm gonna try and set a filtered tank up for my bigguns now as that reading was scary.

I know we all use different methods, but Ive found the 100% method clean quick easy and with very little deaths, obviously you loose some due to bad genetics or whatever, but mine are all thriving and doing really well, over 200 of them, the eat so much now its unbelievable! x