Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello all,

I need urgent help/information! I have 14 newly morphed European Fire Salamanders. They all have morphed at different rates. The oldest of them will be morphed for 7 days on Saturday, 04/26/14. I have tried numerous ways to get them to eat. I've only had one so far that ate one single blood worm and nothing since from any of them. I need to know how long it will be before I should expect them to begin to eat! I'm so afraid that they will not make it. I've brought them so far that I don't want to lose them now.

Please someone tell me how long newly morphed Fires will go before they eat. Also, please if anyone knows any tricks to make feeding easier then I will be so grateful.

I've tried feeding them bloodworms, cut up night crawlers, fly larvae, and even a small cricket. I use tweezers to try to feed them but not luck yet.

Thank you in advance to anyone that can help!

From what I understand, live is the most important when trying to feed newly morphed babies.

You could try an easy to monitor tub. For the newly morphs ones you could put them in plastic containers with wet paper towels, a piece of cork to hide under, and some food. This will make it easier for them to find food, as they may have a hard time in substrate and may not want to take from your hands.

Also try more than blood worms, offer appropriately sized crickets, wingless fruit flies, and other worm types such as small earthworms and red worms which are similar but easier to find at smaller sizes. They may not want blood worms. If the blood worms are dead, it may stem to that many amphibians have motion based vision and eat when they see food move. I usually use small to medium sized north american land-dwelling salamanders such as slimy salamanders, mud salamanders, and dwarf salamanders.

Hi there!
Thank you so much for all of the information and your hasty reply. I'm getting them set up as you said but do have one question that may be stupid. Since I will be putting in wet paper towels do I still need to provide a water dish as a means for them to get water? I figure I would need to but just want to be absolutely certain. Like I said, I don't want to lose any of them. They've come too far. Thank you again!

I usually keep Eastern Newts and various terrestrial Floridian salamanders such as slimies and two-lines. The newts are aquatic, but have a terrestrial eft stage that just needs a damp environment. The actual salamanders I have kept use a fully terrestrial damp environment as well, not water except after heavy rains causing flooding (in the wild). To be on the safe side you could take a deli container lid and fill it with water. It gives a slight minor depth of water at ground level so that the small salamanders can get in and out without an issue. I would think that the damp paper towels, if kept so, should be enough. I have not kept European fire salamanders before though so I would go with the dish to be on the safe side as I do not know much about their natural history. Are the metamorphosed babies on land areas, bog areas, or still at the lake? This can tell you more about the actual requirements. Again, good luck .