I have a sand eater

I have a sand eating axolotl. I got a golden albino male about a week ago from Skilly (Grace) and he is an absolute beauty.

I haven't been posting a lot of pictures because he is a very quiet little guy and I wanted to make sure he adjusted well.

I have been having trouble getting him to eat, and he has been getting quieter by the day. No longer shying away from my hand, letting me hold him, and today he started what looked like gasping.

I contacted Grace and she watched a video of him for me and suggested that she thought he had been eating the substrate and was impacted. She recommended fridging him immediately which I set about doing.

I set up a small storage container which would give Butters room to move around while in the fridge. I was acclimating him on my counter by adding colder and colder water to reduce shocking him - and I was videoing him acclimating.

Then, what do you know - he spits out a mouthful of black sand.

So now he is fridging for a few days until I am confident that he has expelled all of the sand while I redecorate his tank to be bare bottomed.

Here is the video - not very entertaining for most of it but towards the middle you can see him spit out black sand

sand eating axolotl - YouTube


Here is the end clip of the longer video I had originally sent Grace - refusing to eat, showing his lack of caring about being handled, not moving his back leg, and what I described as gasping.
gasping axolotl - YouTube


I want to really commend and recommend Grace - she got back to me immediately when I voiced a concern and was immensely helpful!

More sand in the fridging container this morning -

Siphoned out the sand, changed out the water and back in the fridge....I think he has more to get rid of!

Wow! You may have to go bare bottom in the tank.

Yea I will be re-doing his tank before he goes back in. Shame - the black sand looked so lovely and really brought out his coloration!!!

I have lots of assorted tank rocks, I will see if I have enough rocks larger than his head to use in his tank. If not he will be going bare bottomed!

Or you could put some pretty black tiles at the bottom of the tank to help bring out his colour. That way he cannot gobble up anything he shouldnt Hope he gets better soon x

He has stopped spitting up sand - hopefully tomorrow I can move him back into a bare bottomed tank. I may put a few larger rocks in to see how it looks.

Is he eating sand deliberately or consuming it with his food ? If it is accidental use a shallow plastic container to drop pellets onto and feed them worms etc with tongs, this will reduce but not eliminate accidental sand consumption. If he is eating sand deliberately, remove it and use a bare bottom, just be carefull about bacterial build up, run your finger across the bottom of the tank , if it feels slimy wipe it off.

He was sitting there gulping it down.

I hand feed earthworms. Their food does not sit on the tank floor and wait for them to chance upon it.

What type of black sand is that? There are two main types sold in pet shops. I've heard of some called 'black beauty' which is actually iron slag and is used in sandblasting. I've done a bit of research on the black sand because I'm thinking about using it in one of my axolotl tanks. In my research it states that the 'black beauty' sand can raise iron levels and could cause cuts internally if injested. The other type of black sand found in pet shops is called black tahitian moon sand which is supposedly a little safer to use.

it is called "Marine" black sand listed for fresh and salt water safe.

I am going to be safe than sorry and just remove the sand. He can't be trusted with it obviously.

Thats a shame. I use that sand in all my tanks and only have good things to say about it. I like the black slate idea mentioned above.

crazyfishlady said:

The other type of black sand found in pet shops is called black tahitian moon sand which is supposedly a little safer to use.

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I started a thread a while ago entitled "is sand safe", tahitian moon sand was mentioned as potentially unsafe.

I'll have to check that out, thanks.

it is a shame because it looked great. I may just ask the hubby If I can set up the 36G bow front I have in the garage rather than two individual 10 gallons.

He and my female wild type are just about the same size and one tank is easier than two!
I am breeding my acf again and the ten gallons are so useful in separating out different stages of development.

Do to having to do a rescape, the hubby let me set up a 36 gallon we had in the garage rather than keeping the axolotls in 10 gallons.

Here is the new tank - http://www.caudata.org/forum/f46-be...xicanum/f58-sick-axolotl/80383-upgrading.html

Can anyone give me tips on introducing the two axolotls together? They are both about 7" and one male, one female.

Jenste said:

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Can anyone give me tips on introducing the two axolotls together? They are both about 7" and one male, one female.

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As long as they have both been quarantined put them together in a tank, thats pretty much it to be honest, they might scare each other to start with if they have been kept on their own for a while but they should settle down together quite fast. Just be careful when feeding them that they are not too close together as they may accidentally bite each other when they smell food. Adult axolotls of a similar size are generally chilled out in each others company, however they may occasionally become aggressive, just watch their behavior and separate if one starts being bullied, this is unlikely.

thank you Ian. I will do it this afternoon after work. Should I introduce them with lights on or off? The female used to live with another axolotl before but I am unsure about the male.

Also could you check out the other thread I linked to? I posted pictures of rocks I wanted to use in the tank but wanted to check their size first

Jenste said:

thank you Ian. I will do it this afternoon after work. Should I introduce them with lights on or off? The female used to live with another axolotl before but I am unsure about the male.

Also could you check out the other thread I linked to? I posted pictures of rocks I wanted to use in the tank but wanted to check their size first

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As long as the pebbles are too big to fit in an axolotls mouth they will be ok, if yours are still growing you will have to anticipate their eventual size so it is best to err on the side of caution and make sure the pebbles are way too big.
As for having the lights on, i really cant answer, i never use tank lighting with my axolotls, i only turn them on when i want to check how clean the tank is. I find that axolotls dont hide as much if the lighting is dim, mine tend to head for cover when the lights are on, sorry i cant help with that question.

Thanks Ian.

I am going to try putting them together in an hour or two when I will be able to watch them.

also, I had the reaction from someone in an axolotl group that the 36 gal is only good as a temp tank? I thought this was a definite improvement from just individual 10 gallons...

opinion?

Jenste said:

Thanks Ian.

I had the reaction from someone in an axolotl group that the 36 gal is only good as a temp tank? I thought this was a definite improvement from just individual 10 gallons...

opinion?

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lol, you are opening up a can of worms with that question, opinions will vary on optimum tank size. Axolotl.org says two adults can be kept in a ten US gallon tank, i personally think this is a bit on the small size for two adults if they are big ones, i am sure they can survive happily enough if you keep the water within acceptable peramiters but i prefer to see my guys swimming about or having a bit of personal space to chill out in if they choose . Bottom surface area is important, axolotls like floor area to wander about on so long tanks are often seen as being preferable to deep ones, though to be honest i like to put a couple of adults in 3ft deep tanks to avoid temperature fluctuations and increase water volume.