Fungul infection?

I have two strauchii juveniles. I was out of town for a few days and when I got back one of them was missing the last 1/2" of his tail and the end is whitish gray and fuzzy. Just the tip looks bad and he still seems active and healthy. But I know catching an illness quick is a priority with newts. Should I try to treat it with anything or should I see if it will go away. I think he may have gotten it from poor water quality. I fed them extra before I went out of town for a few days and when I got back and cleaned the tank there were a lot of worms hiding under their rocks. I plan to do more small water changes. Any help would be great, thanks

Most likely a fungus. In order to heal it you can perform a salt bath. I've heard that salts such as aquarium salt work perfectly.

Check out this: http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/salt.shtml

If you don't treat it soon his tail will start to deteriorate more.

How strange. I had exactly the same thing happen to one of my strauchii juveniles 2 years ago. Stranger still, I found the piece that had come off its tail on the bottom of the tank!

I wish I had some good advice. I kept mine in the tank initially, but after a few days it was clear that the injury hadn't healed (the tail had ragged edges). I tried taking mine out of the water for a while, hoping it would heal better out of water, but the tail never healed. It did not get infected, and the newt lived a month or two, but it stopped eating and eventually died. I know this isn't what you wanted to hear!

If the tail tip looks fuzzy (as opposed to just a ragged edge), I'd recommend doing salt baths. The standard treatment for fungal infections in axolotls is twice per day for 10 minutes in a solution of 2-3 tsp salt per quart of water. See:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/salt.shtml

Please keep us posted.

Ok I will try a salt bath when I get home tonight. How do I disinfect their aquarium? Just wash everything with hot water or something?

One more question while I am cleaning the tank. I have contemplated putting sand down on the bottom of the tank, which is bare right now, because the strauchii seem to be having trouble walking around because there bodies are so low to the ground. None of my other newts have this problem, so I have don't know what to do, but I don't like gravel because the worms get lost in it. Is this even a big deal or will they grow out of it? Also if their bodies are rubing against the aquarium floor and then I put sand down, will it scrape their bellies?

No the sand will not scratch the belly. It is okay to have sand in the tank with them.

For cleaning read through this:http://www.caudata.org/cc/faq/FAQhou.shtml

Hi Cameron,
I went to that link and I have looked at it before, it doesn't say anything about disinfection the aquarium. I know how to do water changes, ect. I just read on the previous link about salt baths that I should disinfect the sick newts' aquarium. Are you saying that just water changes do that or do I need to take everything out and wash it individually and change all the water to new declorinated water? Thanks for your response I'm just a little confused by what "disinfecting" means.

Try making water changes with natural spring water. You take out other objects in the aquarium and wash them. Then rinse them thoroughly and place them back into the aquarium.
Disinfecting basically means cleaning of bacteria or something that is covering a material.

Well the poor guy was dead when I got home from work, so I have the other one quarantined while I clean the tank. Thanks for your help.

I doubt that it's even necessary to disinfect the aquarium. Don't forget that if you completely clean out the aquarium, it has to start all over with the cycling process. Tell me if I need to explain this further.

I've always kept strauchii in a bare bottom tank, although a lot of the tank is taken up with stones of various sizes. Instead of sand, I'd recommend pebbles of various (non-swallowable) sizes.

I have my little strauchii in a very small carrying cage right now. He's probably about three inches long and the cage is maybe 5" by 10". I cleaned out the 10 gal tank they were in and was going to wait to set it up again until I move in a week to two weeks. I have been trying to feed him daily with bites of nightcrawler which he has been eating and I am doing a small water change every other day. Do you think he will be fine for a couple of weeks or should I put him in something larger? I have a larger temporary cage that is about twice the size of the one he's in, but I don't want to move him again unless it is necessary.
I guess I also have to figure out how long I need to have the old tank up and running before I put him back in it.
I took him right out of that tank and put him in distilled, treated water in the little cage and that didn't seem to bother him. But the circumstances were different I guess.

As long as you keep doing small water changes every day or two, he should be fine in the small container. However, distilled water is not good, unless you add other components to it. Dechlorinated tap water would probably be better, but change it gradually.

See:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/Spring_water.shtml
http://www.caudata.org/cc/faq/FAQwat.shtml