Shiny slimy newt

[natuhlee]

Hi everyone. I have two young fire belly newts. About five days ago, I noticed one looked like it was about to shed. However, the next day he (she?) still had that layer of skin on, and the next day it started to look slimy. Then it was less slimy and mostly very shiny. It has not been acting sick or refusing food, and my water test came back with nothing wrong with it. I checked on them this morning and (s)he was still shiny (but not wet), but when I came back 15 minutes later, it looked good as new! Any idea what was going on?

 

[natuhlee]

I hope the pictures attached this time!

 

[Asevernnnn]

It is most likely a disease from being wild caught, it looks kind of like 'the shine', and I personally don't know how to treat it, though I would isolate it in a separate container with a moist paper towel substrate, and hopefully someone else has some info on treatment.
How are you housing it? I would be careful with that moss, it looks like dead sphagnum moss, which can be very acidic.

 

[natuhlee]

The moss is just dried, but I soak it before I put it in. The guy from the store I got them from suggested it. Do you think its bad? Is it possible that the poor thing is stressed because of temperature changes, and once the weather evens out he'll be ok?

 

[Asevernnnn]

Don't believe what you hear in petstores, they know next to nothing 3/4ths of the time. I would ditch the moss or test its pH as soon as you can.
I am still unsure of treatment, but if its too warm, illness is very likely, but I still think its probably a thing from being imported, and if its spending a lot of time on land, its probably really stressed or was stressed and is not not used to the water, adults are mostly fully aquatic

 

[natuhlee]

Thanks for your help! How would I test the ph of the moss? When I had the water tested a couple days ago it was at 7.2. Also, theyre still young and growing and becoming more aquatic. They do spend a lot of time on "land" but will go into the water for food or to get from one side of the tank to the other. Is it possible maybe it was sick when I got it a couple months and is just now showing symptoms?

 

[Autumncrossing]

Generally most of the time the newts you buy from petstores are not young at all, they are wild caught once aquatic adults. They might look small because of malnutrition. Ditch the moss, sphagnum moss is awful for newts just get some nice live plants they will love you for it .

 

[natuhlee]

Thanks for your reply! I hear what you're saying about them being small from malnourishment, but they've about doubled in length. Im sure you know more about them than I do (I'm a first time newt parent). So I should get rid of the moss, add live plants? What types? I also have the water very low, about three inches because I was under the impression young newts just like the land and take time to learn to swim. Should I raise the water level?

 

[Asevernnnn]

Terrestrial adapted newts should start out with a shallow amount of water (1") filled with only a lot of aquatic plants, without any dry land. After that you can start increasing the water level every couple of weeks until they go aquatic.
Also some points to make to make sure you know, they should be fed chopped or small whole earthworm for a staple diet, and the tank should be kept cool

 

[natuhlee]

Gotcha. So I should find short aquatic plants, any specific suggestions? I also have some bamboo in there which they like to crawl on. I feed them live black worms, which they absolutely love tank is generally cool, but our weather has been all over the place lately so its been a little hectic trying to keep it steady! Thank you again for all your help!

 

[Asevernnnn]

I would switch to live earthworm or nightcrawler, chopped needed be with black worms or other things every once and awhile, I've heard of people getting deficiencies when raised on only black worms. I personally am not a fan of bamboo in tanks, the tops have to be out of the water which isn't usually ideal in fully aquatic newt tanks. I like to use java fern, java moss, hornwort, dwarf hair grass, sword plants, and elodea in most of my newt tanks.

 

[natuhlee]

Ive had them in a really stable temperature for the past couple days and he seems to be much better! I'm hoping it stays that way! I will definitely be doing more research on that moss and I found an exotic pet vet just in case. But he ate more than his fair share today and is crawling around like a happy little newt!

 

[Chinadog]

If he's eating and acting normally the shiny skin could have been from shedding. I would also recommend ditching the moss as a matter of urgency and set them up a nice aquatic tank with loads of fast growing plants asap.
Here's a pic of one of my newts shedding for comparison.

 

[natuhlee]

Hmm that's very interesting. Thats what he looks like! But usually after they shed I find the skin in the tank. I guess its possible he ate it and I didn't notice? Im concerned having live plants makes a tank a lot harder to take care of, because then you have to worry about giving the plants proper nutrients and everything. I saw on here that someone put hornwart in their newt tank, and that looks good and leafy. Any opinions on that?

 

[Chinadog]

The plants will make life much easier for you, not harder! They will get all the nutrients they need from the newt waste.
Hornwort is fine, it seems to do well in normal aquarium light levels and cold water, some others are Java moss, Hydracotile, Elodea (regular cold water pond weed) and Java ferns. The plants won't need any special care other than trimming back every now and again, these kinds of aquatic newts love climbing and hanging out in dense tangles of stems and leaves though, so they wont mind the plants being left to go nuts!
All those are plants that can be grown without any substrate, you can leave them to float and spread over the surface to form resting places for the newts, or tie them to rocks or driftwood with fishing line, its still important that there are plenty of plants at the surface because that's where the newts will spend most of their time once they're settled in.

 

[CatSpit]

The plants will make life much easier for you, not harder! They will get all the nutrients they need from the newt waste.
Hornwort is fine, it seems to do well in normal aquarium light levels and cold water, some others are Java moss, Hydracotile, Elodea (regular cold water pond weed) and Java ferns. The plants won't need any special care other than trimming back every now and again, these kinds of aquatic newts love climbing and hanging out in dense tangles of stems and leaves though, so they wont mind the plants being left to go nuts!
All those are plants that can be grown without any substrate, you can leave them to float and spread over the surface to form resting places for the newts, or tie them to rocks or driftwood with fishing line, its still important that there are plenty of plants at the surface because that's where the newts will spend most of their time once they're settled in.

Chinadog's advice is so true and very informative given that he's even listed the various plants that do well and ways to use them! Planted tanks are easy to keep and my newts love hanging out in the plants. I just have to trim the plants back sometimes as they grow so fast and that requires very little effort!!

 

[natuhlee]

Well you all have convinced me! I think I'll have to travel to the big fish store for these. I doubt petsmart or petco would sell most of these plants. Does anyone else have opinions on using gravel? Its not small enough for them to eat and they seem to like it.

 

[Asevernnnn]

I would ditch gravel, even if they can't digest it, it still traps a lot of waste and food which can foul the water quickly.
I would used rinsed playsand/aquarium sand, or just leaving it with no substrate

 

[natuhlee]

Alright, heres newt tank 2.0! One of them immediately climbed up the side of the tank to get as far as possible from the new plants, but the other one dove right in to explore!

 

[natuhlee]

They're so funny!