Illness/Sickness: Red Slime on hands after handling Axolotl

My axolotl doesn't seem to be eating her pellets. I tried buying some shrimp and having them in the tank with her and I don't *think* she is eating them, there were a couple of dead ones at one point but there haven't been any dead since and they seem to just scuttle around cleaning the pellets up.

In the mean time my axolotl seems to be swimming around, getting her air and just generally acting normal like nothing is wrong at all, but I see absolutely no evidence that she is eating.

I picked her up a moment ago to inspect her a bit for any signs of distress or trouble and there's nothing (I can see) in her mouth (she has sand substrate anyway).

I put her back into the water and she frantically swam about a bit before stopping. I looked at my hand and there was read slime on me, it didn't look like blood, and I can't see any cuts on her, so what could it be?

I've been looking at her (dark) skin an there's a tinge of redness in her tail which made me wonder if she was infected but she has no other symptoms (bar the eating issue) and the tank has been clean - i have a very good filtration system etc.

Any advice at all is welcome!

Hmm as an edit i have found that theres a slight cut at the end of its tail so maybe the red was from that?

I wonder also whether she is constipated and therefore not eating, she keeps floating and going for air, and when I put her in her butt was floating around above the rest of her until she found a way to get comfortable. I've not seen any poop in the tank for as long as she's not been eating.

If you think she's constipated you can give her a couple of wax worms dipped in olive oil.

Did you pick her up with dry hands? That can damage their skin.

It sounds like constipation is probably the reason for her floating to the top butt first. This happened to my mature female axolotl about 3 months ago. She kept floating and would only eat a pellet or two occasionally. She was like this for almost 2 weeks before she finally pooped. I was almost desperate enough to fridge her but I was trying to avoid this because I have read that I should only use that as a last resort only. I'm not even sure it would help with constipation but I wasn't sure what was wrong with her at the time.

Otterwoman said:

If you think she's constipated you can give her a couple of wax worms dipped in olive oil.

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I wish I had this advice months ago! Thankfully everything turned out well for both me and my axolotl but if she gets constipated again I will have to try this.

I don't have axies but my vet recommended this for one of my Tylos when we thought she might be constipated.