Ahhhh!!! i only just put them together!! now there are spermatophores everywhere!

[shane]

ah. there are nine spermatophores (spelling?) all around the place! im happy about it all but im shocked! i only just brought a male axolotl and only 4 hours ago put them in the same tank. at first i was a bit worried because she was tryign to eat him and he wasnt eating anything. now he'sswimming around like crazy leaving smp's allover the place! i thought at least they would at least settle in. is it just a survival thing?. make as many babies as u can as fast as you can?...lol

im going to trying and look after a few. but i know i wont be able to look after more than 20. has anyone got any tip for first time rearing?.. ive read all the info on axoltol.org so hopefully im up to it. lucky its the holidays so i have time to take care of them.
it'll be her first egg laying if she decided to pick any of the stuff up. i feel sorry for her. ive had her for about 2 months before i got the new guy she has quite a character he better not (like he is now)supress it lol. he is trying to push her onto the smp's poor girl.. she's being pushed around. lol.maybe ill have to buy a new tank. one for himand one for her. dont want then to be breeding like rats.

about the rest of the eggs...how is the best way to get rid of them?.... i just cant take care of too many. oh and what kind of effect willit hav on the female?...poor thing lol... can they willingly not take upthe sperm?... lolso many questions...im still shocked... i walked in to my room and the male was there shacking his backside.... lol

i must go...(still shocked)... lol bye

 

[anne-marie]

Shane, I just did a short post in reply to you over in the gallery section under "Yay, no more gravel".

Have you had a major temp dip over the last few days - it seems all us suckers in Australia have had eggs appearing - it's that time of year i guess.

I'm freezing my eggs to kill em before they develop - 2 days in the freezer apparently.

 

[shane]

thanks thats good to know. yeah it has been getting colder here, especially at night. im on the east coast so it must be the same all over australia. i have been leaving the window open at night. so maybe when he was in the container and she in the tank they... :S:S i dont know lol. thanks for the advise in the gallery section.... i dont really want tohave to touch the eggs either.. (if she decides to pick up the smp's)

 

[nathan]

Is it only me that isn’t getting any spermatophore in Australia. Dam my boy is lazy, I want some eggs too. Um Anne-Marie who do you think was the farther to your lot of eggs

 

[anne-marie]

The eggs were white / black so the father must have been dark coloured which limits it to 3 of the 5 males. I am assuming it was Quetzal, the other 4 males are under 1 year old, and I actually saw Quetzal swimming around and being sociable the day before I noticed eggs being laid. Quetzal is usually a lazy guy and just sits around, so swimming was a big difference.

 

[shane]

EGGS! AHHH WHAT DO I do?!!?!!? *ahem* sorry im so excited my first eggs!. its amazing watching them lay their eggs. so many little black/white round things... lol. its so amazing. im going to look after a few ive already taken them out of the tank. i cant believe she has layed eggs i only put the male in this time yesterday. but they seem to be getting along better than they were. she has stopped trying to eat him. i noticed she was a bit stressed, and very very quiet for what she normally is. he is more quiet now too. it was nice of him not to bother her while she was laying. this is so exciting. i hope at least one stays alive to grow up....

well im new to this but ive read all the stuff but im still unsure......

do i need a filter??... maybe not itmight suck the eggs in!...

i need to aerate it dont i?....
food! ive read brineshrip is good. newly hatched stuff i found this a couple of weeks ago.. i really didnt think they would have started so soon....i thought i would have at least had time to get the things i need....

http://www.aquaticlifeaquariums.com.au/ <- does anyone know anythign about that? it looksgood especially because i dont have much time to get it all going....

sorry everything is all over the place... i really didnt think she would be laying eggs so soon... she is still so young.. i feel sorry for her she must be so stressed..

ok im going off to research some more. ^_^ .

 

[nathan]

yes, i thought it would be Quetzal because in one of you pics (when you put in the sand) he had his tail raised. i think this is a sign?

 

[shane]

she is STILL laying. i feels bad now by putting the male in with her. its obviously cause her does anyone know how long they lay for?. i still cant believe it. ^_^. also with getting rid of some of the eggs is just freezing them like Anne-marie said good enough. or should i just leave them in with the adults?

 

[anne-marie]

I have used that aqaurium shop link and they're pretty good.

You will have around 2 weeks before the eggs hatch so get the eggs and hatching set up ready. I used a couple of 2 litre bottles with the ends cut off for brine shrimp hatching. Throw in an airline and stone, buy a cheap small heater to fit into the hatchery and you should get a good yield - also you're gonna need salt.

Depending on the amount of sperm she picked up, she could be laying for around three day (personal experience of Tonantzin) Most of the eggs should be out in around 24 hrs though.

 

[peter]

shane,
i would suggest leaving the eggs where they are until she finished laying them all.
from my experience, all of the eggs are not going to develop and all of the larvae are not going survive.
if you start culling your eggs now, you may end up with nothing to show for all the hard work you are about to put in to raising babies.
i would suggest having another tank set up (or partition your main tank) to allow the eggs to mature and in would do it soon as i recently had approx 350 eggs layed, probably 100 were either eaten or disloged and ended up the filter inlet, so i had roughly 200 eggs in another tank of which 150 might have hatched and natural attrition took over from here.
there seemed to be the daily "about" 5 that died whilst others began to thrive.
i am now down to about 40 babies and still get 1 dead per day.
now, the food part.
Daphnia (live) is what is recommended but i
could only find frozen Daphnia, so i am hatching Brine Shrimp. takes a bit of a set up, check the main site re: feeding babies and it will link to a live food site and show you the setup.
if you have trouble finding it, answer back and i will take a picture of my set up which looks a bit like a drug lab.

i hope you have some success raising you first batch.

peter

 

[shane]

Thanks everyone. she is still at it. ive got another tank.. well container set up that i can put the eggs into once she has finshed her thing. im a bit worried about the food though. brine shrimp sounds like the easiest to set up... but i dont really understand how the bottles are set up in that pic on the link in the main page....:S:S:S lol. i was also wondering can wild type axolotls have albino young?. ive done a bit of genetics at school and read someof the genetics page. but is it likely to happen?. and how can u tell. just white eggs?..

this is so exciting. but im thinking of getting a sepperate tank for males and females i still cant believe that it all happened 2 hours after i put the male in with the female!. is it usually like that?

 

[anne-marie]

The way I did the set up was kind of messy but it worked ok. Cut off the narrow-lid end of a large plastic bottle. Put in the right quantities of salt dissolved in the water amount which is usually stated on the brine shrimp directions. Put in your heater and your airline with stone. Put in the brine shrimp eggs. Easy but messy.

When they've hatched, strain through a stocking stretched over a bottle, jug etc and feed to your babies.

I'm sure there's lots of other ways of doing it, but this is the way I did mine.

And boy, am I glad I don't have to think about having to do this stuff all over again.
(sighs of relief)

Oh, and I just noticed this from your original post Shane - "lucky its the holidays so i have time to take care of them" Woohoo - six months holidays eh!

. Sorry, I apologise for the sarcasm but I was amazed at how much time they take up and how long it takes to get the damn things sold.

Good Luck

.

(Message edited by waltona on July 11, 2005)

 

[shane]

yeah lol i know it'll take so much time. it already does with only 2! but to get all the little eggs properly taken care of so they have a chance of hatching. omg she is still at it. when will they stop?. lol. thanks alot for your help. hopefully this all works out. ^_^ thanks again

how will you know if they have been fertilised? will they all be or do u just have to wait until they form. :S...

 

[claire]

Shane - after a couple of days, the unfertilised of eggs that have died should turn grey in colour and will eventually 'disintegrate' if thats the right word. there are some pictures of eggs on the rearing section, which show an egg that was unfertilised. my axies have had eggs again but ive decided to leave them in the tank so the adults can eat them once they have hatched. i know it sound awful but they started developing before i could freeze them. Good luck with the ones you decide to raise! its so much fun watching the babies grow up and develop. hehe.

.

 

[nathan]

i love it when they twitch

 

[claire]

lol i know its great! its so funny!

 

[shane]

hey. wow she has finally stopped! i cant believe how much skinnier she is now. even before i put the male in with her (i still need names!) she was getting very bloated, i thought i was giving her too much food. but now she is ALOT smaller now. was that all the eggs? what if i never put the male in. would she have just kept them inside her?... :S everything is so confusing.

she laid so many more this morning that i havent had a chance to put in the freezer so im hopeing that the pet shop around here will be willing to take them in. how many in average actually hatch?

well i have togo dig up worms now because the male wont eat anything else! she's fine she is eating again. im glad thats all over she seems very stressed while that was all happening.

 

[shane]

oh just another thing. would pet shops have brine shrimp eggs?. im going to have a look tomorrow. but if most dont it'll be much easier just to get it off the internet.

thanks everyone for your help

 

[lisa]

Hiya Shane,
brine shrimp from pet stores are usually large brine shrimp (way to big for newly hatched axies). To feed your babies you will need live brine shrimp hatching every day. I had 3 hatcheries (staggered a day apart) going at once for my babies. I bought my brine shrimp eggs over ebay.
Also you can feed microworms, but I had trouble finding a culture in Aus.
Most pet stores wont even think about taking axies until they are about 15cm long. But you may be lucky.
There is an article on Caudata called "microfoods" which lists all the best foods for little baby hatchlings.
I too was amazed at the size difference between "full" and "empty" girl axies... Make sure you keep the food up to her for the next few weeks so she doesn't get run down or sick.
My axie layed approximately 150 eggs. I left most in the tank for the axies to eat when they hatched. I moved about 50 to a seperate tank for hatching, then after hatching all the baby axies were divided up into 6 tubs.
About 5 - 10% or the eggs that were layed were infertile, or died.
Trust me, the hatching is the easy part. After they've hatched be prepared for daily water changes, twice daily feeding, and no spare time or money for months.
I spent heaps, only to have all my little babies die on me because my brine shrimp wouldn't hatch fast enough.
But yesm, go to all the websites you can, read up on everything, and have everything prepared ahead of time. Especially food! Good Luck, feel free to email me if you have any other questions.

 

[shane]

thanks heaps. i know this is going to take up so much time. i was wondering about feeding the newly hatched axoltols.
how much at a time?, how many times a day? how long will they be eating brine shrimp?... and how much brine shrimp eggs should i get?. omg so many questions. i have about 80 eggs in the sepparate tank.

thank you so much again everyone. hopefully this all works out.