Please help, not eating, severe red spots!

Short version:
Female axolotl laid her first batch of eggs, only about 10 eggs, not viable. Stopped eating after laying eggs, tried many different foods. Separated from males. Gills began to pale. Water in normal range. Started swimming in spirals. Brought her to another axolotl owner to try and care for her. Since there, skin developed severe spotting.

Long version:
My female axolotl (9 months old, 8.5 in long) laid her first batch of eggs a few weeks back. There were only a couple of eggs, maybe around 10, and they ended up not being viable. After that she stopped eating. I tried nightcrawlers (full and cut), red wigglers, and bloodworms. Her gills began loosing color, and after a week of not eating I asked another axolotl owner to take her and try and treat her in case it was a water issue on my end. I tested water, it is all within normal range (ammonia 0ppm, nitrite 0ppm, nitrate 20ppm), temp 62F. My other axolotls in the tank are doing just fine. I use Prime as a water conditioner, and let water sit (with prime) for 24 hours in buckets before adding it to tank to let chlorine evaporate. Since she has been in the care of the other axolotl owner, her condition has worsened. Still no eating, laying on side or swimming in spirals. She uses Aquasafe conditioner, and is doing water changes daily (not sure how much, I'm assuming 100% because she said she picks her up to remove her). She tried fridging for 2 days, and indian almond leaves. No luck. Unfortunately she had a fungus hit all her axolotls including mine so she had to recover from that, too. When I first dropped her off she said she saw very slight red spots (I don't recall seeing them), but today they are really bad. I'll post some photos of what she sent me today. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated, I'm out of ideas...

I've never seen anything like this, and I doubt very many folks here have either. I would seek a vet immediately for professional advice.

As above get it to a vet, if those spots were on a person I would think it was septicemia

A third vote for a vet trip. I would agree with Ian, it puts me in mind of a blood infection.

To me it appears as a skin infection. What should also be a concern is the behavior as tilting to one side, corkscrew swimming, and inappentance may be an additional infection, if not symptoms of the first.

I'll also vote for a vet and for the appointment being somewhat soon.

Sylerwin said:

Unfortunately she had a fungus hit all her axolotls including mine so she had to recover from that, too.

Click to expand...

Sounds like she wasn't doing something right? Perhaps the water wasn't clean?

Did you manage to get a vet appointment?

She is being kept in a tub of clean, cold Dechlorinated water. I do daily 100% percent water changes for all of my babies and her. There was a fungus issue but it could not have been from water quality because I only leave food for 4 hours with the babies and I do a water change. Then one before feeding again.

I have been doing research trying to figure out what to do for her but I haven't come up with many answers.

The fungus actually started the day after I tried to use an Indian almond leaf with her to try to prevent fungus or heal anything bacterial.

When I first got her from Ava I inspected her and I noticed that her skin was wrinkly looking and it seemed scaley. Very rough looking. Kind of like chemical burns or something.

Currently I have been trying to get her to eat but when I offered her bloodworms she spat them back out and when I tried again she actually spat at it and gave me attitude. Pretty much refusing it. Same with cut up earthworm. She won't take it.

Whatever she has will only get worse and might not be reversible if you wait too long. As said before, find a vet ASAP, if its something really bad they will be the only ones able to help,

and do not forget to tell them that your axolotl has come into contact with not only yours but your friends in case it is infectious.

It looks very much like septicemia to me. If left untreated it will most likely kill your lovely little axolotl, this needs treatment from a veterinarian pronto .

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback. I'm currently on the hunt for a vet who will handle axolotls, so far nobody in the area, so I'd have to travel a while to get her treated. Still waiting on call backs from vet offices to answer whether or not they'd handle axolotls. Hope I can get her in. Thanks.

Okay I'm at the vet and he said my pH was high (I knew this, and when I posted about it a while ago other axolotl owners warned me against adjusting it). The vet (who also owns axolotls) told me to buffer my pH and use aquarium salt from now on. He believes it was long time coming, and he's thinking it's a lost cause because she is showing signs of being septic. We're doing a radiograph to check for lung development in case she's trying to morph, in which case we may just euthanize her as it's kind of the point of no return. We'll see.

I can see no evidence of morphing

Why is your pH so high? If it did this to this axolotl your others are in danger too. Idk why those other owners said to not try and fix it. You'll want to slowly lower it and maybe see if you have something in your tank that is causing it to rise (certain rocks can do that).

The pH is just abnormally high where I live, sadly.
I ended up euthanizing her after all, which broke my heart, but she was simply suffering too much. I had the vet take radiographs of her to check for lung development, and there was gas in her abdomen, which he said was the beginning of morphing. He recommended I use pH down, but only in my water change buckets, so the pH change is slow and gradual, and doesn't shock them from now on. He also recommended using aquarium salt, which I originally bawked at, but he said he did it for years with his axolotls and they thrived. He gave a long scientific explanation for it which unfortunately went over my head, but he's the vet, not me, so I'm going to trust his judgement on that. I'll post the photos of the radiographs here, as well as under general discussion just to show everyone what they look like.
The second photo, which is the side view, is what shows the long, dark path running under her spine--that was gas in her abdomen, which caused the spiral swimming. And he also confirmed she was septicemic. Thanks for taking the time to read this, hope I can improve the living conditions for my remaining axolotls.