Illness/Sickness: Help! My axolotl has fallen ill with what appears to be fungus on his mouth. Advice needed. : (

[ephemeralBouquet]

Hallo, my name is Sylvia and my axolotl's name is Graphite. As of recently I've realized my axolotl wasn't acting himself and seemed distressed, his front has been floating more than usual, his mouth is also opened more and there is an odd white patch forming on his mouth along with something fuzzy forming on the top, his tail has also been curling. Last week we set up and moved him into a new tank, we've been working on this tank for over a month, we received it from a friend who along with fish used to keep rodents in it, we thoroughly cleaned it, recaulked it and reinforced and added to the stand which holds it. Along with the new tank the axolotl has also gotten new tank mates (and live plants and sand), we've added more snails to the tank, ghost shrimp, zebra danios and guppies, we got his tankmates from PetCo and PetSmart. Within the first few days in the tank the axolotl ate several (6 to be exact, that is a lot, I know) of the guppies, so we decided to move the guppies to the betta tank where they currently reside. Because of this binge I originally had come to the conclusion he must be constipated and have laid off on feeding him since Tuesday and plan to feed him again Sunday morning, as he has been floating and looked bigger than usual. As of today (Sunday) he has slimmed down, pooped several times, and no longer shows much of the original signs of constipation, his front still floats slightly. On Thursday (could've been Wednesday) I noticed a white spot on his mouth which looked like an injury and shrugged it off assuming it came from the one of the fish he had eaten, as the last one he ate I noted had what seemed to be an injury on the tail, it looks like it was cut off and possibly could've been sharp enough to cut the axolotls mouth. Yesterday I realized the white spot had grown and decided to look further into it, from my research I concluded that he could have some sort of fungus on the mouth, and that others gave their axolotls salt baths. With this information I decided to give Graphite his own salt bath. When giving him the salt bath I realized the white stuff on his mouth came off, It did however reveal that something which looked fuzzy and somewhat reminded me of velcro on the top of his mouth. The salt bath consisted of two quarts of water and four teaspoons of aquarium salt, I left him in for 10 minutes. After the salt bath I put him in a separate tub filled with clean water and took photos of him. I realized he was floating less and overtime looked less stressed, the spot of him mouth looked better too. After an hour I put him back in his tank. Today, however, there is bad news. The spot on the top of his mouth has grown (he front was also starting to float again, it has stopped after the salt bath), I gave him another salt bath which seems to have done nothing, and then I put him in a separate tub of clean water again. Luckily, since being in the new tub he has pooped twice and is acting, for the most part, normal. I have also realized that along with the growing formation on his mouth, his gills look smaller, there are also bubbles on one side of his gills which makes me think there could be a fungus, he also goes up to the top of the water to gulp for air. My dad suggest that we purchase "ick remover" to put in the aquarium or use aquarium salt, is this a good idea? Throughout my previous research I have heard of people putting Indian Almond leaves in their tanks or Holtfreter's solution (which I do not know how to make). I would like to also note that my axolotl's diet consist of nightcrawlers and I'm curious to know if there is any other food I should feed him to help him recover as I've heard of people feeding their axolotls different food to aid recovery.

And now, some photos.

1/6/2023
pre salt bath

post salt bath

1/7/2023
11am

7pm

Thank you for reading! Any and all advice is appreciated, have a good day ^_^!

 

[wolfen]

he has an open wound on his mouth, this isn't likely caused by injury but by the fungal growth, using 100% holtfreters in the water should help clear it up but I don't think all of your plants will tolerate the salinity, if you want to use holtfreters but haven't got the ingredients to make the solution at the moment then you can add 665g of salt to the tank water which will bring it up to the same salinity as 100% holtfreters, see here for info on holtfreters ... Axolotls - Requirements & Water Conditions in Captivity
it might be worth while using methyline blue bath to treat the wounded area.
also even though you have plants make sure that the water is oxygenated with air-stones.

 

[ephemeralBouquet]

he has an open wound on his mouth, this isn't likely caused by injury but by the fungal growth, using 100% holtfreters in the water should help clear it up but I don't think all of your plants will tolerate the salinity, if you want to use holtfreters but haven't got the ingredients to make the solution at the moment then you can add 665g of salt to the tank water which will bring it up to the same salinity as 100% holtfreters, see here for info on holtfreters ... Axolotls - Requirements & Water Conditions in Captivity
it might be worth while using methyline blue bath to treat the wounded area.
also even though you have plants make sure that the water is oxygenated with air-stones.

Thank you for the advice. I assume that the measurements provided will work fine for a 50gal tank? Also what kind of salt did you mean when you said to add 665grams, I have aquarium salt, kosher salt and epsom salt, would any of those work? And, I’d like to know if you know of any alternatives to a methyline blue bath which may be easier as it seems risky to do. I may be wrong, I haven’t had to treat my axolotl for any illness before so I’m quite lost. I’ll be going to the store today and will make sure to get some more air-stones, water test kits and possibly some methyline blue. Once again thank you for your advice and time, I highly appreciate it ^_^

 

[wolfen]

yes the 665g salt is for the whole 50 gallon tank (works out to being 3.5g per litre), provided the aquarium salt is only sodium chloride it should be fine (some aquarium salt is a tonic salt which is a mix of salts), I don't know if kosher salt has iodine added or not so unless sure best to err on the side of caution and not use it, epsom salt is magnesium sulphate which although used in modified holtfreters is used in smaller amounts, the amount of epsom salts that would be used with 100% holtfreters is 0.2g per litre ( 38g in a 50 gallon tank)
methyline blue is dosed at half the amount that is used for fish, info here.. Methylene Blue as Anti-Fungal & Anti-Parasitic Drug for Aquarium Fish although there may be people on this forum which can give additional advice, acriflavin can also be used as an antiseptic bath (as with methyline blue, half fish dose), black tea can be used as a bath and almond leaves can be added to the aquarium which your snails and shrimp will enjoy.

 

[ephemeralBouquet]

Unfortunately my dad would not let me add all that salt to the water, we did however test the water and added some other products. I tested the pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels, the pH was 7, ammonia 1.0ppm, nitrite 0.5ppm and nitrate 10ppm. I then tested our own tap water as a control group, the pH was 6 (or lower), ammonia 0ppm, nitrite 0ppm, and nitrate 10ppm. To balance out the ammonia and nitrite levels we added Microbe-Life Nite Out 2 which one of the pet store employees suggested (they also own axolotls), I want to note that the axolotl is being kept in a quarantine tank (which is being cleaned everyday) while the fish, snails, and shrimp are still in the tank. My dad also added a tablespoon of aquarium salt (we have the Imagitarium brand) to the filter that he said would dissolve into the water and help it, he's kept fish since the 90s so I hope he's right. We purchased both methylene blue and black tea, we couldn't find the almond leaves but I'll try to get them so we have them if needed. Using the website provided we filled a tub with 3 gallons of water and I think 10 drops of methylene blue (we decided to base our measurements more off of the back of the bottle while keeping in mind the measurements on the website) and dipped the axolotl in it for 10 seconds. After dipping the axolotl in the solution it appears that the fuzz on his mouth started to come off, I'm going to test the tank water and dip the axolotl again tomorrow.

Here is a photo of the new air stone (not mentioned above) and the axolotl after being dipped in the methylene blue solution. As of right now, after the photo has been taken the fuzz has almost completely come off, we don't want to rip it off so we're letting it fall off.

 

[wolfen]

if possible get a test for kh and gh, the chances are that they are going to be bad anyway but better to check, kh should be 3-8 8 being better, gh should be 7-14 14 being better.
with ph being so low (ph should be 7.4 - 7.6) you are going to have continual problems with ammonia and also health problems with your axolotl because of soft water.
axolotls are slight brackish moderate to hard water animals, your father should understand the importance of having the correct water chemistry especially if he has kept any type of specialist fish which require unique environments.
with your TAN (total ammonia nitrogen) being 1ppm and assuming that your temperature is 18°c or lower your free ammonia is 0.0033 which is safe but looking at your nitrites at 0.5ppm they are very bad and need to be dealt with as a matter of urgency.
for treatment of fungus and other issues 100% holtfreters is used, to prevent issues and to ensure correct water parameters 50% holtfreters is used, it is also now standard to use 0.2g epsom salts (magnesium sulphate) with 100% holtfreters and 0.1g epsom salts (magnesium sulphate) with 50% holtfreters to ensure vital mineral inclusion of magnesium which also further improves gh.
although 665g seems a lot of salt it is only 3.5 thousandth and will only just register on a refractometer.
holtfreter ingredients at 100% per one litre of water is.. sodium chloride (salt) 3.4g - 3.5g, calcium chloride 0.1g, potassium chloride 0.05g, sodium bicarbonate (bicarbonate of soda) 0.2g.
the salt improves salinity and also protects against ammonia and nitrites, potassium chloride and calcium chloride improve mineral levels and also increase gh they also help protect against nitrites, sodium bicarbonate improves the kh which will also help improve ph and prevent bad ph this will also have the effect of improving ammonia breakdown.

 

[ephemeralBouquet]

Sorry for the late update, the week is busy for me due to school. (I'm also rewriting this now as I closed out of the tab by accident, oof.) On Monday night I decided I would give Graphite daily salt baths and keep him in his quarantine tank with about 40-50% of the suggested 3.5 grams of salt per liter, I only did a portion of the dosage due to my own anxiety about something going wrong while I'm away for the day. My measurements concluded to be 10 grams of salt per 2 gallons of water, I intentionally did the measurements a bit sloppy so they're not super exact. As you mentioned it would, it's helped clear up the fungus and it's also prevented more from growing. At this rate with the daily salt baths and solution in the quarantine tank I'm sure he'll be back to better health within a week. He ate on Wednesday and is acting himself again, he no longer appears to be stressed, and his gills are looking better. Now onto the aquarium, we got test strips from the local pet store, they didn't have test specifically for gh or kh and I'm a bit skeptical of the accuracy since they measure for like ... everything it seems and how quickly the process was. I'll attach a photo of the results below, I took the sample on Tuesday so I'm not sure how they apply now (my dad also added stuff to the water after I did the test which probably modified the chemistry, idk exactly what he did). Due to school as I mentioned earlier I am quite busy and won't be able to do anything to the tank until the weekend, probably Sunday. As of right now the fish, shrimp, and snails appear to be fine and behave as usual, I will not be putting the axolotl back in the tank until the parameters and temperature are correct. I always run the water at exactly 64F (a little below 18C according to google) when filling the tanks and the quarantine tank, the temperature does gradually rise overtime though to room temp of 70F, the rate of which it raises depends on if someone decided to put the thermostat higher or light one of the fireplaces. I'm working on figuring out how I want to maintain the temperature and the water itself, and I greatly appreciate all the advice I've been given so far. :-D

The first photo is of Graphite today (1/12/2023) and the second is of the water test results (1/10/2023).

 

[wolfen]

test strips are ok for quick test as they aren't very accurate but will notify you of issues, for best results use freshwater liquid test, your strip test is definitely notifying you that there are issues.
as to the test results themselves your nitrate is a bit high but not too bad, your nitrites are deadly, 0 good 0 - 0.5 bad 0.5 > deadly, your kh is very bad, kh should be 3° - 8° (54 - 143) higher being better, your gh is very bad, gh should be 7° - 14° (125 - 250), your ph is very bad, ideal ph should be 7.4 - 7.6, below 7 the aerobic bacteria start to struggle to remove/convert ammonia, good news is you have no chlorine.
for water levels see Water Quality Explained: How It Can Affect Your Axolotl's Health - WSAVA 2015 Congress - VIN I tend to disregard the bit were it states ideal salinity as axolotls are slight brackish animals which can fail to thrive without a small amount of salinity as well as leaving them susceptible to fungal issues as well as more problematic issues, personally ideal salinity is 1.75 - 2 g/l, it doesn't have a tolerable level for kh and gh but it has been noted that axolotls are quite happy in water that is higher than 8 kh and 14 gh, lower levels of 3 kh can lead to acidic water and low ph and low gh can lead to anaemia and other issues.