Larval autopsy!

Okay,

back with another report on my noob axololtl farm.

feeding them is hard. cleaning the water out constantly of dead brine shrimp is hard. but i've still got 100+ axolotl larvae and the project carries on.

what i wanted to talk about was something i've noticed,

i'm gonna call it bubble belly and or grumpy gut. sometimes the larvae die, i've heard many explanations, from bad genes to too much food, to too little food, or dirty water etc. among the dead, i am seeing one of two phenomena. 1st, even though there's food, these guys aren't eating it. the others are large and healthy, but some are skinny and sick. 2nd there are those who appeared healthy and then suddenly died or got sick, usually accompanied by the appearance of a bubble in the belly (floating upside down) amongst the other food in them.

bubble belly tends to get the larger healthier looking ones, the skinny ones tend to convulse and die eventually or eat and act as if it never happened, as for the bubble belly big guys, well i'm not sure exactly what is causing it. i've got them in 11 different containers. certain ones don't develop any malady (like the big one, even though the cat knocked it over and i had to pick them up off the carpet), while others just seem to fail.

i had said earlier that one of my twins died and the other is well.

i think though, the culprit may be brine shrimp eggs. they clog their stomachs and then the food rots in their bellies and they die maybe?

i'm feeding a lot of axolotls. because there are so many, i have lost a bit of my emotionalism about it (some not all). but i do want to do the best job i can raising them.

after noticing the brine shrimp eggs in many of the dead and dying ones, i think i'd better clean up my feeding habits.

i'm going to separate them into more smaller containers again soon, but it's easier to clean and change the water of the few large ones i have going.

anyway, is that right? would brine shrimp eggs kill larval axolotls? what else might be causing bubble belly?

are all of them, even though displaying different symptoms, dying from my mismanagement? the underdeveloped thin ones; brine shrimp eggs clogged them and they starved to death. the well developed healthy looking bubble belly ones; brine shrimp eggs clogged them and the exploded on their own rotting guts.

i was told (here) that the water has to be swimming with brine shrimp. i monitor their bellies and try to keep them all well fed and the water clean.

the other's don't seem to develop bubble belly/grumpy gut. but it would be good to know!

they're a bit too small to dissect, but that's what i can see so far!

other than that, it's going alright. with a bunch of leucistic (sp?), melanoid, albino, possibly golden albinos thrown in the mix. although i would wager the majority are wildtype, how soon can you tell? overall, even with the deaths, i think it will be alright. 100+ is far too many to raise unless you want to make a part time job of it. and unless i'm doing something really bad, i should still end up with 100+ juveniles in a couple more months!
:happy:

i can't wait till i get past this stupid brine shrimp phase. it's really time consuming and messy!

olmxalotl

i have never raised babies but i have read that they do float more that adults.....i have also read that the 2 most common problems with raising babies is water and feeding.....from what i understand the bubble belly is a lack of food and their tummys fill with air causing the bubble.....and the water is so full of food that the water fouls very quickly....someone with more knowledge will be able to help im sure............everyone please correct me if im wrong
lea

ok, bubble from lack of food?

i can't figure out whether to feed them more or less! what about the ones with food in their bellies (orange from recent feeding) who still float upside down?

maybe the salt water from the brine shrimp? maybe its the change in the weather? it's getting colder down here.

as far as the filthy water goes, i have one colony/box that i don't change the water in as often and its the most stable of them all with the fewest deaths and most developed axolotls.

your suggestion did encourage me to feed them again though :happy:. i feed them 1-2 times a day usually.

olmxalotl

What kind of set up do you have for hatcing your brineshrimp?
And where did you get the brineshrimp eggs?
Have you considered getting a brineshrimp net, so that way you dont have to put salt water in the axies cotainers when feeding them?

Kim

Hi,

what is your brine shrimps breeding procedure?
1) You have to make sure that only the hatched brine shrimps are put to the larvae. The eggshells can be harmful for the larvae. It´s like gravel for the adults. The eggshells stay in their stomach and gas is building up, the larvae begin to float and you can see the air bubbles in the bodies.
2) Before putting the brine shrimps to the larvae, you have to rinse them carefully and you may stay them for some minutes in fresh water to wash out the salt.

Tina

i will try a brine shrimp net, i was using a hankerchief before.

maybe the brine shrimp eggs and or the salt, because it tends to happen most in the larger tanks where i have to put the most food. ppm there's not a lot of salt, but i have been pretty lax with the eggs.

it's good to hear that the eggs may also be causing the bubbles.

i spawn the brine shrimp in plastic 1ltr water bottles, reverse them once they've hatched and settle to the bottom, squirt the concentrated brine shrimp into a small cup and then siphon them out and put them into the water. i don't always clean the brine shrimp of the salt water, but i do add an equal or greater amount of fresh water afterwards. and i siphon off the dead shrimp and the axopoop from the bottom of each tank once every 1-2 days.

i guess the weird thing is the one that i would expect the most deaths from, given the density of population, the cleanliness of the water, and other factors (my cat spilled them on the carpet) is the most stable.

should i feed them less but more often?

the difference between them and the others is the depth of the water and that these ones hatched earlier (by about a week). should i put the others in deeper water? i had heard that you should have them in shallow water so they get access to the shrimp which pool on the bottom.

the other problem is keeping the brine shrimp alive. i try to feed them freshly hatched brine shrimp daily, and they don't keep that well. i sometimes can get another round out of the bottle the next day of swimming brine shrimp, but won't put them in if the bottle is full of dead shrimp.

lastly, when will it be clear what color they are? it's hard to tell!

there were a few deaths today again. it's cold. do they dislike the cold? should i move them to a heated room?

regards,
olmx

kimko86 said:

What kind of set up do you have for hatcing your brineshrimp?
And where did you get the brineshrimp eggs?
Have you considered getting a brineshrimp net, so that way you dont have to put salt water in the axies cotainers when feeding them?

Kim

Click to expand...

i get the brineshrimp eggs from the local petstore. i'll look for a brineshrimp net in nz today.

olmxalotl

You can always feed live daphnia as an alternative to brine shrimp. I raised about 100 baby axies recently, and I fed them small daphnia from the very beginning. You are correct- it is a part time job. At one point, I had about 75 containers in my one-bedroom apartment. It was out of control! Luckily I found new homes for all but 6 of them (which I kept for myself).

Through my research prior to raising the baby axies, I learned that you must be very carfeul not to add unhatched brineshrimp eggs to the baby axie tank. It was my impression that the baby axies could not properly digest the brineshrimp eggs.

Regarding the bubbles in the bellies- I firmly believe this is from the babies not getting enough food. To prevent this from happening, I tried to keep my tanks full of available live food (daphnia). Daphnia can survive for several days in dechlorinated water, so they do not foul the tank water to the same degree as brinshrimp which cannot survive in fresh water for an extended period of time.

Best of luck with your babies in the future! I can totally relate to the amount of time and energy necessary to raise 100 baby axies from eggs to juveniles. Hang in there. If you need any tips for effective shipping methods, I would be happy to tell you what I learned. I can proudly say that I only lost 3 babies during the shipping process.

I used this brine shrimp hatchery and then when they were mostly hatched I would clamp the hose and disconect it from the bubbler. I waited for the Brine Shrimp to swim to the bottom, and then I would just unclamp the hose and then siphon it into my tank. I would reclamp it a few times during the process to wait for the remaining ones to swim to the bottom that way I would get most of the brine shrimp and less of the salt water and egg shells. But I realize that your supposed to use a net to catch the shrimp and then rinse them off, then you put them into the tank. I also just kept mine in a large 55 gallon tank, againe not the best way, but it worked for me.
What really helped me with the brine shrimp was buying eggs that had a 95% hach out rate, so that way I didn't have as many unhatched eggs to worry about.

As for the coloring, I had to wait a few weeks to figure out some of the coloring
Yellowish ~ Gold Albino
White Body/Black Eyes ~ Leucestic
White Body/White Eyes ~ Pink Albino
Dark Color/Gold Ring arond the Eyes ~ Wild Type
Dark Color/ Fully Black Eyes ~ Black Melanoid
These ae the only oes I have had experince with.

Now I may be corrected, because I'm going to be up front and say that I don't know near as much as some others on this forum, but my intentions are to help and learn.

Kim

shoegal said:

If you need any tips for effective shipping methods, I would be happy to tell you what I learned. I can proudly say that I only lost 3 babies during the shipping process.

Click to expand...

I would love to learn about your shipping methods because I'm in the process of trying to rehome my 100+ babies, lol. Feel free to send me a message.

Thank,
Kim

shoegal said:

You can always feed live daphnia as an alternative to brine shrimp. I raised about 100 baby axies recently, and I fed them small daphnia from the very beginning. You are correct- it is a part time job. At one point, I had about 75 containers in my one-bedroom apartment. It was out of control! Luckily I found new homes for all but 6 of them (which I kept for myself).

Through my research prior to raising the baby axies, I learned that you must be very carfeul not to add unhatched brineshrimp eggs to the baby axie tank. It was my impression that the baby axies could not properly digest the brineshrimp eggs.

Regarding the bubbles in the bellies- I firmly believe this is from the babies not getting enough food. To prevent this from happening, I tried to keep my tanks full of available live food (daphnia). Daphnia can survive for several days in dechlorinated water, so they do not foul the tank water to the same degree as brinshrimp which cannot survive in fresh water for an extended period of time.

Best of luck with your babies in the future! I can totally relate to the amount of time and energy necessary to raise 100 baby axies from eggs to juveniles. Hang in there. If you need any tips for effective shipping methods, I would be happy to tell you what I learned. I can proudly say that I only lost 3 babies during the shipping process.

Click to expand...

i'm looking for places that provide daphnia.

i still can't tell if its not eating enough that's killing them or if its the brine shrimp eggs. i lost a couple more today, as i was worried about them and may have over fed them clogging the water?

i'm changing them all to deeper habitats, and the next feeding, i will fresh water soak the brine shrimp.

one of them was dead with a very full stomach. maybe it had a brine shrimp egg lodged in its guts and blew up?

i'll keep you posted and thanks for the help!

olmxalotl

kimko86 said:

I used this brine shrimp hatchery and then when they were mostly hatched I would clamp the hose and disconect it from the bubbler. I waited for the Brine Shrimp to swim to the bottom, and then I would just unclamp the hose and then siphon it into my tank. I would reclamp it a few times during the process to wait for the remaining ones to swim to the bottom that way I would get most of the brine shrimp and less of the salt water and egg shells. But I realize that your supposed to use a net to catch the shrimp and then rinse them off, then you put them into the tank. I also just kept mine in a large 55 gallon tank, againe not the best way, but it worked for me.
What really helped me with the brine shrimp was buying eggs that had a 95% hach out rate, so that way I didn't have as many unhatched eggs to worry about.

As for the coloring, I had to wait a few weeks to figure out some of the coloring
Yellowish ~ Gold Albino
White Body/Black Eyes ~ Leucestic
White Body/White Eyes ~ Pink Albino
Dark Color/Gold Ring arond the Eyes ~ Wild Type
Dark Color/ Fully Black Eyes ~ Black Melanoid
These ae the only oes I have had experince with.

Now I may be corrected, because I'm going to be up front and say that I don't know near as much as some others on this forum, but my intentions are to help and learn.

Kim

Click to expand...

thanks kim!

i think that i should have a mix of melanoid and leucistic and maybe a few wild type (they look kinda yellowish). we'll see as the develop! did you keep the brine shrimp or the axolotls in the 55 gallon tank?

regards,
olmxalotl

I kept the babies in a 55 gallon tank and the brine shrimp in 2 liter containers, but when it came time for feeding, the brine shrimp did go into the 55 gallon tank, lol.

Kim

All types of stress can cause bubbles, or more generally floating.

For example :
- lack of food (maybe it's nor the case),
- water quality,
- too many animals in the volume.

Bubbles in a larva's belly can be cured by placing the larva correct way up in a small flat dish (e.g. petri dish), without water, and adding water drop by drop until it has just enough water to move about in, but not enough to turn over.

Then add loads of food. When it's eaten enough food, it will be able to stay the right way up in normal water depths. This should only take an hour or so if the larva is generally healthy.

I've never tried this with axolotl larvae, but it works well with European newt larvae.

caleb said:

Bubbles in a larva's belly can be cured by placing the larva correct way up in a small flat dish (e.g. petri dish), without water, and adding water drop by drop until it has just enough water to move about in, but not enough to turn over.

Then add loads of food. When it's eaten enough food, it will be able to stay the right way up in normal water depths. This should only take an hour or so if the larva is generally healthy.

I've never tried this with axolotl larvae, but it works well with European newt larvae.

Click to expand...

wow thanks!

i'll try that.

i've still got enough if it doesn't work...

olmalotl

olmxalotl said:

wow thanks!

i'll try that.

i've still got enough if it doesn't work...

olmalotl

Click to expand...

!!!

it works! i think i saved about 4 axolotls from the guts of doom so far. i still feel like their food is killing them, but now i have a hospital method for the sick ones. i wish i'd have known this in time to save the twin!

thanks.

olmxalotl

Thank Goodness I won't be hatching brine shrimp. Sounds like alot of trouble and mess. Good Luck to you.
lisa

If the ones in the main tank are doing better than those in individual cups, it makes me think the tank water is more stable, and that might be the cause? Just a random guess.