Stone gorging

[abbey]

Barnaby is driving me batty.

She is ingesting stones to the point where i can see them poking out of her belly.

If (for arguments sake) they dont get stuck or perforate an organ, is there any great damage?

I am attempting to make a feeding platform out of slate so that food will not be near the small gravel, but its taking olonger than i thought.

the gravel is well and truly small enough to pass through, and she is ingesting enough food as well as her pebble diet...

any forseeable problems?

 

[kaysie]

Why dont you just use bigger stones?

Perforated organs and impacted stones are serious problems and can lead to death.

 

[clarence]

Or don't use any gravel at all. My large tank has broken slate tiles loosely tiled across the bottom, with the spaces in between filled with aquarium sand. I't really easy to keep clean, and looks nice.

Actually, kinda looks like an aquatic garden patio, now that I think about it.

 

[abbey]

I'm working on ideas, but trying to balance the bioload while facilitating cleaning and feeding, its taking a bit of time...

broken slate tiles, like what you get for garden tiling? can they grip on those? they would be ideal (tho, sharper, so the size would be important)

I was going to use bigger stones, but to have them not get eaten, they have to be a good deal bigger, and that size stone is rarely available with a rough surface so that makes it hard for them to get around (no grip) or else i would have done it long before.

Plus, it lets waste food fall between, which increases the likelyhood of toxic buildup, which is a pain in the backside.

the sand idea.. whould they not just get sand ingested the same way as stones?

(Message edited by Calla on June 21, 2004)

 

[michael]

I use bare bottom tanks with plastic rocks and caves. They get around fine. You shouldn't have that strong of a current that they have to fight to move.

 

[abbey]

There is hardly any current, just enough to move faecal matter... they just cant seem to get a grip with their toes on anything smooth, and Barnaby mopes and stresses trying to get where she wants to be.

Do you use acrylic tanks or glass? are they new or old glass? Maybe a sheet of acrylic on the base would work?

 

[sharon]

I keep my axos a lot like Michael. Bare bottom tank, plastic cave, some large river rock, several pieces of slate, some live plants and some silk plants.

I have a very small gravel vac for getting into the small spots, it works just fine for getting old food and fecal matter up.

Sharon

 

[michael]

I have acrylic and glass tanks. I also keep juveniles in plastic tubs. None of my setups have strong enough current to remove all of the axolotls excrement, I siphon it out and use a turkey baster for small axys.

 

[katy]

I use river stones that are an inch or more in diameter. They're smooth, but i pile them up and make it uneven and my leucistic doesn't have an issue with it. They're small enough for there to still be somewhere for the bacteria to live between them, plus I have live plants.

 

[abbey]

I have switched to sand, which, although they still swallow small amounts, tends to fly out of their mouths when they are 'chewing' so i think thats a better solution for all involved.

I have some large river stones in there too

1 week later and they are still excreting the old substrate!

 

[ashriel]

Hi all (new) I have the same setup as Katy by the sounds of it, as I used to have "stone = food" issues... if you are worried about the stones passing through her, put her in a bare bottomed container and feed her a little meat covered in castor oil (just break open a capsule) it smells really really gross, but it sure helped my baby, who had the same thing; stones visible in her belly...she passed them all in 3 days.
Hope that helps somewhat

 

[abbey]

Thanks Ash, i think most have passed now. I fed them high veggie content pellets and they cleared it out pretty quickly, but there is still one or 2 shaking loose.

I think they will be ok on the sand.... *crosses fingers*

They live on mud in the wild don't they?

 

[charlie]

Snork has a couple of inches of blue sand to walk about on , it compliments her golden skin wonderfully - she seems to enjoy piling it up in some areas of the tank and making little lotl shaped depressions in others to lounge in. i haven't noticed her eating it, but i have tended to feed her from above, since she's been big enough for earthworms so she doesn't search for food on the bottom any more. i did keep the bottom bare for a while but she really didn't like this. She also has big chunks of slate to hide behind, but no plants as she grubs them up and breaks them into tiny pieces.

Living in a soft water area, i had put some crushed coral into the tank but got worried about her eating that....so until i can make a little mesh bag to hold it together, i've taken it out