White fluff on axolotl's gills?

Hi, everyone! I'm having a bit of a problem with my axolotls and it really is a horrible horrible time for this to be happening because I'm in the process of a move and I have been very sick for a few months and there's just so many things happening all at once but at the same time I would not be able to handle it if one of my axolotls were to become ill and pass away. I don't know what this is, but I was hoping that one of you might be able to help me out!

Over the past few weeks, I've been trying some new food sources for my axolotls because I haven't been able to get their typical earth worms due to them being out of stock where I usually purchase them. So I've tried a couple new things over the past week from pellets to blood worms, none of which they would eat. I thought it was very strange that they didnt want anything to do with the bloodworms because when they were babies I had them fed on nothing but bloodworms. Anyway, I finally managed to procure the earthworms again and to my great surprise, they will not touch these either. Two of my axolotls took one each but refused any others but my third absolutely refused them entirely.

I'm very concerned because they've always been ravenous and they seem to be acting very strange as well; rather alert and active as compared to how they usually are which is lazy and immobile for the most part. Then yesterday I noticed some strange white film on the gills of the axolotl that refused to eat. I have pictures here:



I haven't noticed anything on the gills of my other two, but the film seems to be growing in size and they all share a tank so I'm very worried. Any help or advice you guys might be able to offer would be wonderful!

Also! They seem to be going up for air a lot more frequently than they usually do. I'm not sure if that's relevant, but I thought I'd throw it in there just in case.

It looks like fungus. Fungus usually occurs when water quality isn't good. It can be treated with salt baths.
Here's how: http://www.caudata.org/forum/f46-be...axolotl/72698-salt-bath-picture-tutorial.html

It really sucks this happened now! I know how stressful moving is, and being sick must make it way worse. Hopefully you and you're axie(s) will get better soon :happy:

And to keep you're water quality in check you should do water changes weekly, and keep an eye on you're water perimeters.

Hope this helps! -Seth

That is fungus! It can be deadly, put the ones with it in quarantine away from the others. There are many ways to treat it, search the board for that.

sde said:

It looks like fungus. Fungus usually occurs when water quality isn't good. It can be treated with salt baths.
Here's how: http://www.caudata.org/forum/f46-be...axolotl/72698-salt-bath-picture-tutorial.html

It really sucks this happened now! I know how stressful moving is, and being sick must make it way worse. Hopefully you and you're axie(s) will get better soon :happy:

And to keep you're water quality in check you should do water changes weekly, and keep an eye on you're water perimeters.

Hope this helps! -Seth

Click to expand...

Ah... that definitely makes sense. I usually do bi-weekly water changes thanks to the fact that I have a very poor filtration system (it's cheap and not meant for tanks of this size) and since I've been sick and in the process of a move, I've only managed water changes every other week at best. I'm kicking myself now though to think that this probably could have been prevented if I just stuck to the dang schedule but thank you for your help! I'm definitely going to get this guy set up with some salt baths starting tonight and hopefully my negligence won't cost me his life. I've had him ever since he was a fry and I'd hate to lose him to such a dumb mistake.

That kind of thing has happened to me too, and being sick and trying to keep up with that kind of stuff can be a challenge.

Good luck with the salt baths! -Seth

I have also used Furan-2 for fungus successfully- some people use 1/4 strength but it is safe at full strength. The benefit is you don't have to constantly handle him to go back and forth for baths and it doesn't not irritate gills. Good luck!