Raising H.Orientalis Efts Aquatic!

Sooo i have been talking to quite a few expert newt breeders out there and i have taken on their fantastic info and help and applied it to my newts of my own! i have been breeding newts for three years this is my 3rd generation of newts i have 9 efts currently i sold most of the batch (43 efts originally). For starters i had my newt efts terrestrial for a month feeding them bloodworms, tubifex worms, and brine shrimp. I housed them on paper towels with fake plants etc very simple and very clean. Then i raised the water level in the tank bit by bit (yes with paper towels in it still) and after 1-3 days All became aquatic! Once i saw them in them in the water i immediately put in some live daphia/cyclopes/mosquito larvae for them to eat and get use to the water and learn that food is now in the water not land. so far its awesome and adorable to see them aquatic! most have already shedded their skin from entering the water to a more smoother skin. (some were still climbing in one of the pictures but this was the first day!)

They look nice and healthy! I would put loads more live plants in there with them, they are very clumsy under water and often need to climb up to the surface to breath rather than swim, also the water quality will be much more stable. Good luck with them!

Yeh they look very happy and healthy! I have also just moved my 6 month old JFBN's to an aquatic setup and to my surprise they have taken to the water/plants like a duck to water lol I have filled my tank with 1/2 inches of water and to the brim with live plants (which I kindly received from Chinadog) I must say the wee guys love climbing over all the plants which I think helps them feel safer. Plus it looks nice too Good luck with the wee ones

yeah just added more in thanks!

I wonder if leaving the paper towels in helps...maybe having traction makes them more secure. I see one up on the side in the last photo-he converted over just fine as well?

I did some experiments trying to convert H. orientalis over and had little success overall. Had them on java moss matts and then slowly raised the water level. I ended up with quite a few drowning early on, and also many who just refused by climbing up the sides. As almost everyone who has done this noted though once converted to aquatic growth rate sped up.

For ensicauda I ended up simply raising them terrestrially for 1-2 years before converting them to aquatic-just in naturalistic setups with lots of microfauna and feeding them piles of blackworms/redworms. And they vary a lot in how willing they are to do so. I have one newt that is 8 years old now and still adamantly refuses to permanently convert to water-despite the fact that she only actually gets fed whenever I come home from break so has to be subsisting on a. She is about the size of a C. orientalis still.

without the paper towels the newts are quite clumsy and cant catch food and walk around.
I find that having newts terrestrial for the first few months then converting them had great success i have had drowning before when i left them terrestrial for a year then converting since they were just too use to land. Im going to try completely skipping a terrestrial stage and see how this works too seems like the earlier it is the easier. For sure they grow alot faster in the water on land my newt efts has grown a good bit but not too much but after a few weeks in water they have fattened up very well and are much larger than before overall its great! Well hopefully you will manage to get them aquatic like i did and many others too it may be quite a change but it comes with a very positive result

Here is a little update on the efts (now 3.5-4.5cm)! i have change the tank with now 8 efts total and they are all now aquatic eating very well and very active. The tank is a 2.5 gallon with paper towels for traction since they really seem to have troubles on a bare bottem tank. I added in some live aquatic plants and have started feeding them a diet of bloodworms, mosquito larvae, and copepods. Aqautic newts for the win!