Lotls will only eat if hand-fed?

[monkeh]

I acquired my two girls from someone who could no longer care from them - I don't know how old they are or many details about their previous life. When I first got them, they were eating frozen bloodworm. The owner would put in a cube, it'd defrost and the lotls would go to town on them. Unfortunately it was very messy and I didn't think it'd be a sufficient diet for them.

I've now got them on sinking pellets. I know that the lotls were very fond of being hand-fed treats by their previous owner, but now they seem completely incapable of finding food on the aquarium floor. I have to hand-feed them each pellet to ensure they eat it, otherwise I just find pellets all over the sand 10, 20 minutes after I drop them in.

Is there any way I can 'train' them to eat pellets this way, or am I stuck hand-feeding them every time? I'm assuming they smell the food rather than see it, so the pellets being the same colour as the sand shouldn't be much of an issue?

 

[Alecann]

How large are they? If 4+ inches you could try introducing worms.
I would try nightcrawlers, red wigglers are a good starter worm, they run much smaller than the other types. You can buy them at most sporting goods stores, some gas stations, and wal-mart. I started mine on those. You may still have to hand feed, but waving a worm in front of them is much easier than feeding pellets one by one. Plus, unless the worm is too large, they eat it whole, and there will be no clean-up. Also, as treat, you can give them wax worms, also sold at wal-mart. Mine love them, they're small, easy to eat, and fat. You might even introduce them to worms by first feeding a wax worm or 2, just don't feed them as a staple, they're basically junk food for Axolotls.

 

[monkeh]

they're both 5-6 inches so I could try worms. I'm not sure where best to get them in the UK though

 

[Niels D]

Try to jar feed some pellets together with live food like tubifex or white worms, if you insist on feeding them pellets. The moving food atrracts the axolotls to the pellets. After a few times they'll probably get conditioned to look inside the jar once it's introduced in the setup an they will eat the pellets. At least this is how I got my waltls to eat them. I would still give them a worm or other live food ocasionally though. Variety in food is a good thing.