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Question: Axolotl Morphing

haileyvp

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I am in need of some advice. I first started with axolotls a year and a half ago with an albino GFP male and a melanoid GFP female. They bred before I could separate them, and I decided to raise a few of their babies. A few weeks ago I noticed one of the young one's gills starting to shrink, and in the last week or so it has started to morph, with the tail fin reducing as well. They are about 6 months old now, and the one that's morphing is around 6" long. This one was housed with one of its siblings that is doing great, so I'm not sure why it's morphing, as the water parameters and temperature were fine, though the nitrates were a bit high at times between water changes.

With the holidays, I haven't been able to keep a close eye on it, and the gills have reduced rather quickly it seems. The pictures are from this past Tuesday (longer gills) and today, unfortunately I wasn't able to find a picture of it from before the morphing started.

I've since separated it into a tote to provide it with a land section (doing water changes daily) and removed those few smaller rocks seen in the first image (they were larger than the axolotl's head), but I'm not sure at what point to remove the water altogether and convert it to terrestrial only, with moist substrate. I've done a lot of research in the last few days about keeping tiger salamanders as I couldn't find much about morpholotls (as I've seen them called on this site). Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
 

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EllieWind

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Such a cutie!
You're right, and it's definitely morphing though. Although super rare, it's not completely unheard of for an axolotl to suddenly morph with no known triggers. I'd keep doing what you've been doing so far: provide it with a land area and keep doing regular water changes and feedings. Once axies morph their care is really no different than tiger salamanders. Good luck!
 

haileyvp

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Thanks Ellie! Since my original post I noticed him(?) mainly sticking to the land portion and the gills were completely gone, so I moved him into a new home with coco fibre substrate (the only thing I had available during the holidays, though if he survives and starts eating again I'm thinking about going bioactive like with my reptiles) and a large water dish, and after the first night he hasn't been back to the water. I've also moved him from the cool room the axolotls are in (16°C/61°F) to the main part of my apartment (20-21°C/68-70°F) and he seems to be moving around and reacting a bit more than before.

Unfortunately he hasn't eaten in a week and a half, and even that was a smaller meal than usual. Before the morph he was on a half a nightcrawler every other night, but he refused anything but a quarter piece on Christmas Eve (same date as the first picture, with his longer gills), and doesn't seem interested in anything now. I've read tiger salamanders can't refuse waxworms but my local pet store didn't have any, so I tried butterworms instead, and still nothing. He hasn't seem to have lost any weight, but as he's now a new type of pet (in terms of care) I'm a bit worried, as this is my first terrestrial amphibian.
 

Bellabelloo

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It's not unusual for them not to eat after morphing, give him a little while to adjust.
Treat it now more or less like a Tiger salamander. I keep my newly morphed tigers in a kidded plastic box with a soil mix of garden soil and lead litter , a couple of places to hide like cut drainpipe tubes, bark, slate Dec and I always had a water bowl big enough for them to hop into. Mine would always hop into the water to feed, maybe they initially found it easier, or old habits does hard I suppose. :happy:
 

RobNeoFuture

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Help my axolotl is morphing! He currently still lives underwater but in low water where he can climb up of the water and he seems to be comfortable and happy but he's really gulping in air at the surface quite a bit (I assume from lose of longer gills) and i also have him the other half of the time in a set up with more water and he likes to hide in there or be floating/standing at the surface. Any tips or advice from your experience? I really just want him to be as happy and comfortable as possible.
 
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