Red Eft care, help requested!

Risigan · Oct 7, 2012

Hey everyone! It has been a while since I last posted here. I finally got my hands on a red eft and I would like to get some help from you guys about its care. The biggest problem I have right now is feeding. I have a culture of springtails but I am unsure if they are too small for my eft, his head measures around .75cm across. He is pretty active and larger than the other efts I have kept. I will try to get pics of him and his terrarium soon.

Infamous82 · Oct 8, 2012

I've always had good luck with fruitflies, and even the big "chain" pet stores will have cultures. D. melanogaster are smaller and cheaper, you can get a large culture at petco for $10 I think, and petsmart has small cultures of the bigger D. hydei. You can also order them online at places like josh's frogs. Hope that helps.

Coastal Groovin · Oct 8, 2012

Feed them small clumps of live black worms on a think layer of wet paper towls, Fruit flies are good but they just climb up the sides of the tank and out of reach. Also try chopped small earth worms. They will also eat 1/8 and 1/4 sized crickets depending on the size of the efts. A good culture of white worms and dwarf purple Isopods are also great food sources. Otterwoman always has white worm cultures for sale and I always have dwarf costa rican isopods for sale if they become something you are interested in adding to their diets.

Jan · Oct 8, 2012

And in case you haven't seen it, here is the caresheet from Caudata Culture:

Caudata Culture Species Entry - Notophthalmus viridescens - Eastern Newt

Jan · Oct 8, 2012

You might want to look at this thread also: http://www.caudata.org/forum/f1173-...mus-taricha/86619-caring-very-small-efts.html

Risigan · Oct 8, 2012

Thanks for the quick responses everyone! My eft is around 1.5" not including his tail, which is far larger than the 1.5" total that the efts I tried to care for last time. In the terrarium there is a single small cricket (back legs removed) and a good number of white springtails that are just a bit smaller than pinhead. I am planning on getting some fruit flies, should I get D. hydei or D. melanogastor?

Risigan · Oct 14, 2012

Here are the photos. They bottle cap I used for a size reference is about 1" across. I finally got it to eat 1 small piece of chopped worm. As for fruit flies, should I get d. hydei or d. melanogastor? Sorry for the low pic quality!

reptile · Oct 15, 2012

I have some red efts and feed them mostly blackworms, i get the worms at the local pet store for $2, the worms usually last for 2 weeks or more in the fridge, and feed 6 large efts (i do change the water the worms are in every few days) . When i got the efts they only ate from tweezers and they grew really fat, after a month they started to feed from food put in front of them. i also feed them earthworms cut up, (one of my efts downed a 4 inch earth worm all alone

and didnt eat for a few days), you can also feed them crickets every once in a while which is fun to watch since they "hunt" and catch their prey.

For susbtrate I use coir, which keeps the tank humid and doesnt get moldy, i also have some hides made from coconut which also doesnt moldy and some pieces of bark which they love to huddle under.

Risigan · Oct 15, 2012

I finally got my eft to eat small chopped earthworms. I quite unexpectadly found ANOTHER eft! Finding 2 efts a week apart that are both large and active is extremely uncommon for me. This is the first time in 2 years that I have found efts and believe me, I've looked. The second one is larger than first and he is quite a bit more active. I will post pics of him as soon as I can. Lastly, what size terrarium would be good for these guys? Would a 12"x7.5" container be good? I want to keep it just a bit small so it is easy for me to moniter their health and feeding.

Infamous82 · Oct 16, 2012

That size D. hydei would be better but don't breed nearly as fast as melanogastor. You can feed them small crickets, but i have had red efts and some of my small Ambystoma refuse crickets. I've kept numerous small terrestrials in tupperware containers, 2 efts in the potluck 2qt size is fine, just put some small holes in the lid.

Infamous82 · Oct 16, 2012

Oh and make sure the holes aren't big enough for the crickets or flies to escape

slowfoot · Oct 16, 2012

With efts that size, that are already eating earthworms, I wouldn't bother feeding with fruit flies or crickets. Unless you already have extra bug colonies going or like spending money. Earthworm bits are pretty much the perfect eft food, and flooding the containers with bugs will just result in a lot of uneaten bugs and escapees when you open the lid.

Wildebeestking · Oct 16, 2012

I agree with Slowfoot. No need to vary their diet if you have a steady supply of earthworms. They're full of calcium and are some of the best food available. I occasionally feed mine isopods or bloodworms just because I always have some on hand from having to care for my other caudata. You've got two well developed efts right there. The first picture looks like he's losing his reddish color, same thing is happening to my largest eft right now.

Risigan · Oct 16, 2012

Here are the pics of the newest eft. As you can see he is larger and more robust that the other one. As for feeding, I am looking for something I can buy because it is getting colder now and finding worms is getting tougher. Will efts eat something that isn't moving? If so I can chop up some nightcrawlers into really small peices. I have plenty of frozen bloodworms (I have several fish tanks) so I might try those as well.

slowfoot · Oct 18, 2012

Even big nightcrawlers chopped into small pieces will still move a little. I've found that once they get a taste for worms, they'll seek out even non-moving pieces.

Search

Search

Red Eft care, help requested!

Risigan

New member

Infamous82

New member

Coastal Groovin

Active member

Jan

Site Contributor

Jan

Site Contributor

Risigan

New member

Risigan

New member

reptile

New member

Risigan

New member

Infamous82

New member

Infamous82

New member

slowfoot

New member

Wildebeestking

New member

Risigan

New member

slowfoot

New member

Settings Notifications

Options