Piggy lotls and picky lotls

I have 4 axies all in the same tank together, all around 8". The problem I have is that I have 3 girls who will eat anything and everything I put in the tank, and a boy who is quite fussy.

At the moment all 3 girls are nice and plump, almost to the point of too plump. And the boy is what I can only describe as slim. I'm not worried about their sizes though, it's their eating habits.

Pinky eats like a pig, she'll gulp down worms wothout question. She is always first up when I arrive with the worm bowl, and I swear she would eat 4 if I gave them to her. I don't though, I give her 1 a day, but she'll hoover up anything that is regurgitaed by others.

Pepper is just as bad - she's always 2nd for dinner, but she's a bit snappy. She goes for my fingers, my tattoo on my wrist, plants, other axie toes etc. And she wolfs down her worms with a good shake of her head.

Freckles sits ther looking hopeful like a puppy until I present her with a worm. She's not quite as enthusiastic as the other 2 girls, she waits to be fed, but she can gulp down a worm just as quick.

Red is a boy, and he's gotten quite picky. He refused to eat for about 2 weeks when the weather was very warm, and got quite thin. I managed to tempt him with a few waxworms and a handful of pellets, but I became convinced he didn't like wriggly food. I have taken to blanching his worms so that I can just dangle it in front of him and it doesn't scare him off too much. He is taking a large worm every other day now, and gaining weight back nicely.

But the issue is when I give them live swimming food. I bought a bag of river shrimp yesterday, and put them in the tank. Pinky ate half of them, Freckles and Pepper claimed the others between them, and Red watched the shrimps with interest, but not even attempting to catch one. (Pinky is rather fat today, and I reduced her rations to 1 tiny worm as she sulks if she doesn't get one - I have tried before and she just snaps at tails if she misses dinner)

So is there anything I can do to persuade Red to take live food again? Other than separating them, of course. I'm reluctant to starve him until he does, and TBH with 4 in the tank I doubt there will be anything left if I just wait until he is hungry. Or is it a boy thing?

All axolotls are different. Could be that he's just afraid of live, wiggling things. It can be kind of a pain, I know. My own doesn't like eating anything that DOESN'T move, unless I drop pellets or something straight on top of his head.

I want to know the same thing. I have a worm refusing male axie. The girls like to eat everything. He only wants pellets. He ate a worm ONCE! That's all.

I stopped feeding him pellets for a week. Hopefully he'll get hungry enough to eat a worm.

Could be that the males tend to feel a bit skittish around so many females. Especially if they're aggressive and dominant when it comes to feeding time.

Maybe it is a boy thing! But not necessarily related to females - my Dude is definitely a picky eater and he's by himself. Mind you, I think he has had a less than ideal upbringing. Did your boy come from the same breeder as your girls? I wonder if it is related to conditions in "childhood".

Hmmm, 'boys are picky' seems to fit! Don't know who the parents are though, they could all be related or not. Red used to eat the same as the others, it's only since he matured that we've have this problem.

It's definately not an intimidation thing - I separate the axies by persuading them to follow my finger or a dangling worm - there are less injuries that way.

I'm not really that worried, I'd just like to be able to put some shrimp or guppies in the tank and leave them to it, I guess I'll just have to do it on Red's off day. He might take to guppies though, I have 5-week (and 1 week, and 1 day) old babies in my breeder tank, a few more weeks and some will be lunch-sized.

My male comes under the pig category, he'd eat worms all day everyday if he could.

I had a melanoid male who refused live food. Tried giving him a worm once and he swam off to the other end of the tank! I think it's just a thing some lotl's do, he was fine with pellets.

Layna - have you tried dashing the worms in hot water? Red seems to be taking them quite nicely now. And I find pellets are a bit dry and all my axies spit them out - I have to soak them for a few minutes to soften them up.

Beks - shall we get your piggy male and my piggy female together and see if we can breed a super-race of piggy axies?!

You don't need to 'boil' them as such, just put them in a little bowl and add a dash of boiling water, then cool them with cold water immediately. Or dunk them in hot water - either way works. And you don't lose too many nutrients as it's not 'cooked' - just more like a rare steak than raw meat.

My male did the same thing for a while. It was a couple of weeks of refusing everything. I tried it all. Then one day, he laid spermatophores everywhere and started eating again.....

I have fifteen adult axolotls and all of my females eat better than the males and are more responsive to food. The reason is probably down to egg production, females are trying to produce eggs so will need more nutrition, they will generally beat the males to any food I drop in the tank which is why I make sure the males get individually fed. As long as your male is not excessively skinny I wouldn't be too concerned.

My female will eat and eat but my males isn't particulary picky. The male is slower to food and skinnier then the female but I guess thats normal hearing from others . Both axies love worms but the store I brought them from feed all their axolotls worms when they are juvies so I guess they got use to them from a young age.