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Illness/Sickness: Newts With White Spots

Frost

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I just bought some newts like 2 weeks ago and noticed when i brought them home, two of them had little white spots. It was like a piece of there skin was chipped off or something. Now they are getting a bit bigger. One has one on the back of his tail and the other on his knee. The one with with the mark on his knee i saw that his leg is a bit swollen and he barely moves it just drags but he eats a lot and swims pretty good. The one with the mark on his tail does not like the water and does not want to eat, Guessing because he is stressed (They were kept in a tank with moss and just a bowl of water) Would these mark heal by themselves? Or know what should i do? I'm new to having newts :confused:
 

Chinadog

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Without seeing a picture it sounds like skin sores. Were the newts captive bred or bought from a petstore? If they are Chinese firebellies that came from a petstore their chances of recovery are quite slim i'm afraid as by the time the sores appear the stress of capture importation and poor care at the petstore seems to have pretty much destroyed their immune system. If they are captive bred animals in otherwise good shape, then their chances of recovery are better, but it's not guaranteed by any means.

The treatment I have successfully used in the past involves isolating the sick newts in a clean container with a substrate of damp paper towels and a small hide. I treated the sores by applying Neosporin (the type without anesthetic) ointment directly to the sores twice a day, together with salt baths twice a day as well. After a week or so the sore was starting to heal and skin over so I kept up the treatment for a further two weeks and the newt fully recovered.

As I said, captive bred animals seem to respond better to treatment as there are no underlying stress issues or other less visible problems that are so common in wild caught Asian newts. Good luck with the treatment
 

Chinadog

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Although petco may only have had them for a couple of hours they were captured from the wild a long time ago. After that they would have been on sale in an Asian animal market, most likely in a shallow tray of warm polluted water. after this they would be purchased by a tropical fish importer and held until the orders from various wholesalers around the world were complete.They would then be sent with the consignments of tropical fish, at tropical temperatures to the wholesalers in your part of the world. Eventually when your petco ordered them in for you they could easily have been in transit for a months, in foul warm water without food of any kind. As you can imagine, by the time they end up with the final customer they are highly stressed at best, or on deaths door at worst.
I'm not trying to make you feel bad about buying them, but perhaps you can now understand why they are in such poor condition and their chances of recovering are so slim.
The neosporin treatment is probably their best chance unless you could take them to a vet, even then, with systemic antibiotics,they are so weak and starved that their chances of survival are not good.
If I can help in any way I will, Ben.
 

Frost

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True. One of them died The first day of having them, I'm Guessing that's why. I'll try the Neosporin, Should i quarantine them? And thanks for your help. : ]
 

Chinadog

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Sorry for sounding so negative, but at least you know what you're up against, now.
I would keep them all in small separate containers with the towel substrate and hide, this should stop them re-infecting each other. Keep up the salt baths (there's a tutorial on how to do it in the sick axolotl section) along with the neosporin treatment, but keep other disturbances to a minimum and hopefully they may start to recover. If they will eat, try tempting them with live blackworms or chopped nightcrawlers, getting them to put some of the weight they've lost back on would be a step in the right direction.
 

Frost

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Thanks again for your help. The one with the white spot on his leg looks like its getting a little better on the first day with neosporin and hes been eating a lot. Got all his weight back. The other sadly died, the spot started to bleed and got really worse. Then he lost his hand for some reason.
 

Chinadog

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You're welcome. :) It's such a shame that a lot of people's first experience of newt keeping is with these poor, stressed, wild caught newts when captive bred fire bellies are such a joy to raise and keep.
If the survivor is eating well, then maybe there's a chance it could survive with help from the neosporin and salt baths, I would keep up the treatment and hope for the best.
 
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