Gah problems.

So, I had 4 axolotls, one died, and from what I can gather, it was because he got stuck next to the filter. he ended up with almost no gills and like a pinkish color all over his whole body [he was leucisitc] I did an necropsy, and from what I could find, it wasnt impactation. I had large pebbles in the tank originally, and then i got this stuff called eco-complete, after i INSISTED to the fish tank guy that I couldnt have anything gravel esk, either sand or nothing, but my plants were dying, and he suggested this stuff [i couldnt see the size till I took it home]

so, i put it in, and everything seemed fine, the first axolotl died, and then another axolotl prolapsed [which he ended up fixing himself and is now fine]. I freaked out, and took all of the fish and axolotls and put them in a bucket for a few days while i dumped the tank, and emptied it of the substrate.

Today, I went to check on them, and most of the fish had been eaten, which I assumed would happen, but, one of the fish was a small albino cory cat, and it was stuck in the mouth of my biggest male axolotl.

I pulled him out and my boyfriend and I carefully removed it from his mouth after much effort. We just re-filled the tank [we didnt wash the rocks or plants, and saved 2 buckets of the old water so we didnt have to re-cycle the tank] and put them back in.

He is swimming around a little, must mostly just sitting still. His bottom jaw/bottom of his mouth is really swollen, when removing him it was scratched a little, but as soon as I saw it was stuck, I assumed he would die either way, so I am contemplating putting him in the fridge to see if it makes any difference.

My question is, how cold is too cold when it comes to fridge temp? [mine stays really cold] and how long until i should expect to see any sort of improvement or change? How long can an axolotl be out of water without incurring serious damage? [we worked on getting it out for like 3 minutes] I am really worried about him, and bummed about this whole situation. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated. THANKS!

oh, and i am back to large pebbles, and the remaining fish were taken out of the tank and will be taken back to the store tomorrow. I have been feeding night crawlers and tubifex to them.

Hi there,

0 celcius is the bottom range of temperature tolerance about 5 Celcius is ideal remember they come from glacier fed mountain streams in the wild.

Its ok to have no substrate some breeders and keepers have encountered problems I have two glass tanks with no substrate and no troubles.

Sorry to here about your loss.

Best of luck

Thanks for the reply. Do you think that putting him in the fridge will help anything? He hasnt moved since we put him in the tank.