Half Hatched

Over the weekend, about half of the eggs hatched. Now, little axolotls are swimming around the tank. It is hard to see them unless you look really well because of all the leaves. They make them feel secure, though, so we'll leave them in for now. (no pun intended) I was able to round one up in a cup and put it under the microscope. Isn't it adorable? If you looked really closely, you could see the blood pulsing in its gills.

A baby axolotl under the microscope

Because of the new hatchlings, we decided that the goldfish bowl setup just would not do. Instead, we filled two bottles about halfway with fresh water and placed them on top of coiled heating wire. After letting the eggs hydrate for about half an hour, we added two tablespoons of aquarium salt. Then, we placed the aquarium tubes on the bottom. We have started one successful culture with this method and are hatching another. This morning, we put a few droplets of brine shrimp in the tank with an eyedropper.It was cool to see them swimming around with the axolotls! There are still occupied eggs in the tank; we are hoping for the rest of the axolotls will hatch today or tomorrow. Then we can have a lot of little baby brine shrimp swimming around and being eaten by a lot of little baby axolotls!

The new brine shrimp setup