Axolotls, with their endearing smiles and feathery gills, make captivating aquatic pets. While choosing an axolotl morph can be a delightful challenge, understanding their dietary needs is surprisingly straightforward. In their natural habitat, axolotls are opportunistic scavengers, consuming anything that fits into their mouths. As a responsible axolotl owner, providing a balanced and nutritious diet mirroring their wild counterparts is crucial. Fortunately, most axolotl food options are readily available and affordable.
Wild Axolotl Diet: An Unfussy Eater
Wild axolotls aren't picky eaters, consuming a varied diet of worms, insect larvae, crustaceans, mollusks, and small fish. Being nocturnal hunters, they typically forage for food under the cover of darkness. Axolotls use a unique feeding technique, rapidly opening their mouths to create a vacuum that sucks in their prey. They may also accidentally ingest inedible items like gravel, which some theorize aids in digestion and buoyancy control.
Pet Axolotl Diet: Replicating the Wild
Pet axolotls share similar dietary needs with their wild relatives, requiring a protein-rich diet to thrive. Although axolotls can come out of the water for short periods, they do not live or eat on land.
Essential Food Sources
- Earthworms: Considered the best food for pet axolotls, earthworms should form the cornerstone of their diet. Pet stores commonly offer various types like red wigglers, angleworms, and nightcrawlers. If nightcrawlers are too large, they can be chopped into smaller, manageable pieces. Earthworms such as nightcrawlers, red wigglers, or gray worms are considered the safest and most nutritionally complete food available to feed axolotls longer than 7.5 cm (3 inches). Scientifically referred to as the Lumbricidae family. All earthworms are nutritionally appropriate for axolotls, meeting their dietary needs with >45% protein, a high calcium content, and they are high in calories.
- Brine Shrimp and Daphnia: These small crustaceans are excellent sources of nutrition, especially for young axolotls, due to their size and digestibility. They are available in cube form for convenient serving.
- Bloodworms: While a favorite among axolotls, bloodworms are not as nutritionally complete as other options and should be offered as a snack rather than a primary food source.
- Axolotl Pellets: Some pet companies offer axolotl-specific pellets as a convenient protein source. While useful as a backup, they should ideally be supplemented with earthworms for optimal nutrition. Pet parents who want to supplement their axolotl’s diet with a commercial axolotl food pellet should look for soft pellets with at least 40% protein and less than 10% fat.
- Ghost Shrimp: Ghost shrimp are a nutritious food source, but they can also make sense in cleaning tanks.
Additional Food Options
Axolotl diets can be successfully varied, so long as nutritional benefits and potential detriments are considered.
- Tubifex/Blackworms: These are one of the only healthy options to feed hatchling axolotls once they have begun growing their legs.
- White Worms/Grindal Worms: White worms are best fed to young axolotls, from hatchlings to 4 months of age.
- Daphnia/Scuds: Baby daphnia or brine shrimp are best used for feeding newly hatched axolotls. Regular daphnia can be fed to hatchling axolotls that are a bit larger than new hatchlings and able to eat the larger adult daphnia.
- Brine Shrimp: Baby brine shrimp are best used for feeding newly hatched axolotls
- Springtails and Isopods: Isopods are best fed to adult axolotls 15 cm (6 inches) and larger, while springtails are best fed to axolotls that are at least 5 cm (2 inches) long.
- Bloodworms: Frozen bloodworms (midge fly larvae) may be used as an occasional treat for axolotls. Bloodworms can be fed to any axolotl older than a hatchling.
Foods to Avoid
Insects with hard exoskeletons, such as crickets, waxworms, and hornworms, should be avoided. Some live food should be avoided, feeder fish and mice for example. And you should be cautious about live food, because the live food may carry parasites or disease, which may cause axolotls to get sick.
Read also: Comprehensive Axolotl Diet
Nutritionally Insufficient Foods
Although many different foods have been tested through trial and error to provide variety in axolotl diets, there is mixed success to be found in feeding foods other than earthworms. Many types of meat are very fatty compared to worms, and feeding dried food too often may risk constipation or impaction.
- Hikari Sinking Carnivore Pellets: Risk constipation, bloating, obesity, impaction
- Rangen Salmon Pellets: Risk constipation, bloating, obesity, impaction
- Feeder fish: Thinaminese toxicity (depending on species) resulting in vitamin B deficiency, causing seizures and scoliosis
- Repashy Grub Pie: Minimal risk
- Neocaridina: Minimal nutritional information available, feed as treat only
- Beef products: Excessive uric acid production, visceral gout, renal failure, calcium deficiency
- Salmon: Diarrhea, excessive uric acid production, visceral gout, renal failure, calcium deficiency
Feeding Frequency and Portion Control
- Young Axolotls: Feed as often as three times per day. Newly hatched axolotls need to eat small meals twice daily. Young axolotls need to eat once daily to help them grow properly.
- Adult Axolotls: Feed every two to three days. Adult axolotls over about 7.5 inches only need to eat every two to three days.
At all ages, provide as much food as they can consume within a 3-5 minute period. Ensure the food is smaller than the width of their head to prevent choking. Remove any uneaten food with a turkey baster to maintain water quality.
Feeding Techniques
Axolotls can be a bit dim-witted when it comes to finding food. Instead of scattering food in the tank, use reptile tweezers to present the food directly to them. This ensures they see and eat the food before it drifts away. If an axolotl’s food isn’t quite wiggly enough, pet parents can use feeding tongs to wiggle it.
The Importance of Worms
Worms are the best food source for axolotls, and should always be part of your axolotl's diet if possible. You can mix it up by serving brine shrimp, daphnia, and pellets once it a while, but those items shouldn't replace worms completely. Bloodworms can be a great snack but should never be the only thing you serve your axolotl.
Additional Considerations
- Gravel/Sand: Whether to include gravel or sand in the axolotl habitat is debated. Some believe small pebbles or sand can cause digestive impactions. Others suggest axolotls intentionally ingest them to aid buoyancy control. Most agree that fine sand and small, smooth pebbles are relatively safe for adult axolotls. However, rocks and pebbles should be larger than twice the size of their head to prevent accidental ingestion.
- Water Quality: Maintain excellent water quality through regular water changes. Changing 30-50 percent of the water each week is accepted.
Common Questions About Axolotl Feeding
- How small should axolotl food be? Anything you feed your axolotl should be smaller than the width of their head.
- How often do axolotls eat? Young axolotls eat as often as three times per day, but adults only eat every two to three days.
- What is an axolotl’s favorite food? That depends on the axolotl! Nearly all axolotls love bloodworms and brine shrimp, but some prefer one food item over another.
- What do axolotls eat in the wild? Wild axolotls may eat parts of fish, small whole fish, and anything else small enough to be edible. Most of their wild diet consists of worms, insects, and insect larvae.
- How Long Can Axolotls Go Without Food? Healthy axolotls can go up to two weeks without food, but don’t make them wait that long if you don’t have to. They should be eating two to three times per week, but they may eat less in colder months.
- Can Axolotls Eat Fish Food? While fish food is usually safe for axolotls, it’s not recommended. Fish food is designed specifically for certain fish species, not axolotls. If you want to give pellets to your axolotl, make sure they’re made specifically for axolotls.
- How Much Does Axolotl Food Cost? A container of worms from a pet supply store is typically less than $9. You can expect to spend about $50 for axolotl food annually.
- What Human Food Can Axolotls Eat? Axolotls shouldn’t eat any human food. While they may be able to eat some meats without harm, it’s better to be safe than sorry, so stick to worms and other axolotl-specific foods.
- What Do Axolotls Eat in Minecraft? In Minecraft, axolotls eat buckets of tropical fish. That diet isn’t accurate to what axolotls eat in real life.
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