Fire Salamanders that bite, please help

[lewis]

Hi there, I hope you can help. I have quite a few Fire Salamanders, some Terrestris but a majority are Bernadezi's. Originally they were in two fairly large tanks, one with one type in and another with the other. I noticed fairly quickly that they regularly go for each other, especially when I feed them. I have now divided them all in groups of 2 in seperate tanks but some of them are still at it. To date they haven't caused any real damage to one anouther, but is this normal behaviour as I haven't read about it anywhere?!

 

[mike]

Hi Lewis,
It's normal behaviour for Salamandra to interact with each other especially when there is food around.

They don't in my experience damage each other, but an individual can be intimidated by a fellow inmate to such a degree that it is put off feeding.

Should this be the case separate it from the crowd for a few weeks, taking special care to insure that it is feeding well.

After this brief respite it is normally up to the task of integrating with it's former neighbours without any further problems.

 

[lewis]

Thanks Mike!

 

[samuel]

my smallest tiger is like that at feeding time-thinks he can take ANYTHING and bites the other threes faces!