Fire Belly Newts

[ftx9]

haha hes a little cutie

 

[celestialpoet]

Hi to the Newt lover B) I have two Newts with my community Tank one is very huge and the other very small. The only fish he seems to like to eat are the Neon Tetras. I put three in the tank and two dissapeared. I had one left. Then I bought two more. This two dissapeared. I laugh about because he seems to only leave one. I feed them every other day with Blood worms and their favs are Tubiflex worms. One time i feed the big guy(newt) and the little came too close while feeding and he tried to eat my little newt,but i interveened. Hes fine and. i have had The little guy since Dec 03 with the community tank. I hope this helps a bit.

Buh bye
Bethany

 

[Pugwinkle]

Ok first tank pic in this thread

Will post more in that thread as and when I do them.

I have decided that the filter is creating too much current. For all the info that I have read (thx Pugwinkle) it seems they prefer still conditions. I need to cap the filter output somehow as it doesn't have an ajuster. I had assumed given it's size it wouldn't have been very powerfull.

Anyone got any ideas on that? I was thinking some sort of nozle on the end with a smaller hole in it.

Acording to this link £50 is 120.559 CAD. However you will have to check what tanks your lfs etc has.

Hi, just wondering if you figured out what to do about the current your filter was creating?

How is your cute little newt doing? I'll bet he likes his new home.

What are you feeding him?

 

[lalaland]

I too bought one of these little newts and love it.

It was happily living in my tank with all my fish for ages (as suggested by LFS) and often shared the caves with my dwarf frogs, but recently my pakistani loaches decided to attack him so he's got his own temp. tank while I build something up for him like yours.

One thing to warn people, unlike the advice from my LFS that it's safe to hold these newts, they are poisonous! They have small glands to the rear of their heads and can secrete a venom which if ingested, in contact with skin for a while or in the eyes etc. will cause you problems and may lead to hospitalisation.

When ever I handle my newt I do it as little as possible and always wash my hands thoroughly, but we all do that with aquariums anyway.

Just thought I'd mention that as my LFS was shocked to hear it, but the Zoo I visited advised me.

 

[lalaland]

I notice that the advice states they like lower temped tanks (woops) rather than tropical ones, does this mean I can keep him in a cold water tank or should I include a heater???

 

[Pugwinkle]

I notice that the advice states they like lower temped tanks (woops) rather than tropical ones, does this mean I can keep him in a cold water tank or should I include a heater???

No don't include a heater with Firebelly newts. They do indeed like cooler temps. Between 65 and 70 degrees is preferable. Often it's necessary to cool things down by having dripping ice cubes sitting on the top of the tank if it gets too hot in your home.

 

[lalaland]

Thanks for the advice.

I've been to my local store and got another tank for him as well as a filter and pump for £21 which isn't bad at all.

Just circulating the water for him now.

He's currently living in my quarantine / breeding tank, should I start dropping the temperature in there so he gets used to the cold water gradually? Will putting him straight in the cold water tank harm him?

 

[Pugwinkle]

I would say you should begin to lower the temp gradually. I don't think any type of shocking change of water temp is good for any animal.

 

[Paul_MTS]

i'm guessing there's a difference but one year when we emptied out pond out to change other to fibre glass preformed pond i caught aorund 70 of those litle fellers but with orange bellies.

 

[x-router]

New pictures here:

Newt pics

Thanks to everyone for their input.

Not written much in the last few weeks but have found several problems which hopefull I have now solved.

Firstly my newt likes his food to move

I feed all my fish a mixture of frozen blood worms and brine shrimp with the odd bit of flake and was planning to just use frozen blood worms for the newt..However unless i fed him each worm on the end of some tweasers so it looked like the worm was alive he wasn't interested! That was quite time consuming so I now have a live blood worm container and have finialy found a lfs that sells them.

My next problem was the water moving too fast. Its very clear they like still water. Thank to the suggestions here I tried putting some gause over the filter exit. This worked well however I ran into another problem.

The water temp was over 70F constantly. I had added a stone sucker (Cold water fish to clean up) as well to the tank so it was hot for both of them. So I put a pipe into my existing filter and then into a new home made filter (See the pics).

This filter has a copper heat sync with fins and a fan on the side of it to cool the water. Because it works on a trickle feed the incoming water doesn't make much movement.

I've also added that custom log into the tank in place of the rocks. It has lots of passageways drilled in it and splits he loves to play in. It was rather exspensive from a lfs but worth it I think.

The blood worms sometime wriggle down in the splits and the newt will spend ages hunting them out. He also loves the java moss. It makes a great place for him to hide.

Anyway you may not be able to tell from the pics but he has grown quite a bit and I think my betta's are quite unhappy he gets so much attention as I usally only hand fed them...Still they get some of his live blood worms

 

[lalaland]

My newt doesn't seem to move that much, if ever.

In the tropical tank he spent most time sitting there and in the cold water tank he doesn't move that much either, just sits on his rock all the time, never going in the water.

Should I add a heater to the water? I just have him in a cold water tank now, not heated at all.

 

[vantgE]

i have the same problem i put them in and one will stay in the water the other swims madly till he gets a foothold on something i never see them in the water by themselves i had the heater on normal then turned it down to lowest but it still wont go in

 

[x-router]

What are your water temps?

Newts like between 60-70f. Thats cold water. Anything over 70f and they will feel unfortable. If you check the top of the thread I put my newt into my tropical tank and he basicly wanted out of the water much as vantgE.

From my reading slightly cooler is better as they can stand down to 40f.

Once you have a stable cool water source you will find that he will go in and out of water a lot. You need lots of cover for him and dark place to hide. In an open tank he won't explore much.

Also they are very timid. They will freeze if they see you. Best time to view them is at night with their tank light on and your room light off (that way they can't see you). You might try a moon light in the tank as well.

 

[onyx]

Hi X-Router,

Amazing how in a few short weeks you have gone from absolute beginner to offering your cutie newt the Ritz of Aquariums! Fantastic. That's a great set up you have and your newt looks sooooo happy. Now all he needs is a newty friend, and soon you could be enjoying the patter of little newt feet! That blood worm tank you have - is it especially sold for that purpose? What do you do to keep them alive? How long to they live? I'd like to know because I don't like the idea of keeping bloodworms in the freezer with my regular food. My newts love their bloodworms, frozen or live.

 

[vantgE]

I read bloodworms are just larvae won't they eventually fly away
and i think my heater is pretty much off i haven't seen the heatter heating since i lowered it's temp the
water is at 70