Illness/Sickness: Spots all over...swollen lip?

Alright, so I've had this big male axolotl for 4 years now and he recently (within the last 3 months) began to develop these strange white spots all over his body. At first I thought perhaps he had run into something and got a little scar, but then more and more began to appear. He also developed this strange bump on his lip...at first, I attributed the bump to and accident while eating live food, but now I'm not so sure.

I also wondered, can an axolotl's pigmentation change with age? Could this be some sort of aging thing? The spots are not raised, bumpy, fluffy, fuzzy, or odd in any other way. They don't appear to bother my large male and he has a healthy appetite. He doesn't float or have any strange behavior.

The water should be balanced and his other tankmates include two other alolotls one younger male and female. They have no strange spots or any odd behavior. I do occasionally give them fish to eat as a special treat, but they are guppies that I breed myself and have done so for years.

The substrate on the bottom is fine aquarium-grade sand. In some of the photos my axolotl has got some on his head.

if you have ANY thoughts on this please please PLEASE leave a comment! I'm not sure if I should be worried or not...?





LINKS TO LARGER IMAGES:

http://i839.photobucket.com/albums/zz317/Lori_Stebbins/soc4.jpg
http://i839.photobucket.com/albums/zz317/Lori_Stebbins/soc3.jpg
http://i839.photobucket.com/albums/zz317/Lori_Stebbins/soc2.jpg
http://i839.photobucket.com/albums/zz317/Lori_Stebbins/soc1.jpg

I just dug up this old picture of my big male from the galleries...uploaded in 2009 Caudata.org - Member Galleries - My Axolotl Socrates

spotless...see what I mean?

Hi, my large female who I have had for four years developed some of these at age 2 then steadily got more, aswell as a large patch on her back. She is healthy, eating (alot!) and happy and like yours mine have no furriness or raised spots at all. I believe this may be natural as I have had no luck finding any information, and they are certainly not stress spots! Too large and she gets them when she appears unstressed... Until she appears discomforted I will leave my girl alone, and this for me is going on two years (my girl has about 5 spots and the area on her back).

Hope this helped, I will also upload a picture of my girl if you like! Just for consolation...

I've got an axolotl with very similar skin colour to yours,about 2 years old, sort of black / wild type. He has a big white spot on his forehead and a few on his tail which appear to be similar to those on your picture. I was slightly worried too because as he is getting older he seems to acquiring more spots. This thread seems to be starting to suggest that it's just a pigmentation thing for this particular colour of axolotl, which is reassuring methinks.

My wild type male is approx 7 years old. He has similar white spots on his head, sometimes his bottom lip seems a little swollen too. It seems to occur every now and then.

PHEW! Thank you all for your commentary! It's good to know that there is not a serious problem here! I love all my axolotls dearly and would be very upset if something were to happen to them!

and Yaimfat, a picture would be great! It would certainly set my mind at ease!

Do keep a close eye still on him, if anything changes let us know

Hi, this is my big girl! she is 4 this year and roughly 27cm long, though I havn't measured in awhile! you can see the spots on her head, sorry I couldn't get her back but its like someone sloshed a little white paint on her.