Axolotls refuse to eat

[DeCypher]

Please help. My axolotls are slowly eating less and less and 2 out of 4 are losing weight and a third one is starting to. Otherwise they have luscious beautiful gills and look healthy. I have three in a 55 and one in a tub. Bare bottom, lots of hides, light which I try to keep dim, fully planted with Java moss. They are 8 months old and over the past month they eat less and less. I feed them red worms because night crawlers are too big still and they’ve never had a problem with them. When they were younger I used to do out of tank feedings with tongs in bins where they ate every day. Then i started doing in tank feedings which worked great. Now they just refuse to eat. Every day I’m fighting with them trying to get them to eat; all they do is just back away and freak out over the tongs. I stand there for an hour just begging them to eat. They will go 2-3 days refusing and when they do maybe eat, they’ll eat one maybe two worms if I’m lucky. I thought it was the temperature that was around 70, so I’ve started rotating ice bottles and it’s down to 65 usually. T first this worked a bit, now it’ll be 65 in there and still nothing. Their water was always normal and fine, low nitrites nitrates etc, i do very regular water changes many times a week. Their test strips went bad so I can’t test right now but I haven’t changed anything. What can I do??? I have NEVER had axolotls act like this, if anything they would overeat. What is wrong with them? Should I try out of tank feedings again? Ill try anything. I tubbed one of them for losing weight, and she’d eat worms I left overnight. Now back in the tank she refuses and backs away. I’m so sick of fighting with them on it and all it does is stress me out and affect me. Maybe once a week each of them will have a good day and eat 2-3 worms. I’ve tried dimming the light, cutting the worms smaller. Oh also I started leaving worms in the tank overnight, and that would work and they’d eat them. Now I wake up to all the worms sitting there. I’ve tried cut night crawlers, frozen brine shrimp and daphnia. They just refuse and back away and run away from it. Oh and often times they will lazily “snap” at it and maybe even get the end in their mouth and then spit it out. They won’t swallow it and just kinda half-ass snap. I’m very experienced with axolotls but I took a break of many years and got these guys. I have NEVER dealt with this. Please what can I do???

I always thought the temperature is what started this, it was around 70-71. So now I change out frozen bottles. Admittedly sometimes between or before I change the bottles it’ll be back at 70, and once it cools down to 65 they still won’t eat.

I try things like in tank feeding or leaving the worms and letting them hunt because when the tongs come or accidentally bump them they just start backing away and freaking out and avoiding it at all costs. I’ve never seen such a thing in my life. This used to be fun and enjoyable. Now I just dread feeding time because it’s just a disappointment. I’ll try anything.

 

[wolfen]

if all your axolotls are on food strike (including the one that is tubbed) then there could be a problem with your water, do a full test of the tap water before and after dechlorination, have you noticed any strange smells or taste.
being only 8 months old they should be movement orientated so it might be an idea to use live aquatic food such as shrimp or even fish etc..
if the food strike is due to a sudden disinterest in worms you may need to separate them to prevent them from attacking each other.