The best food for axolotl’s is without a doubt, live earth worms, but how do you keep them? There are giant worm farm tubs available at various garden centres, but having a worm farm outside, totally away from your axolotl isn’t overly convenient.
We have created a mini worm farm that lives under our tank, and its creation is so much easier than you think.
Supplies you’ll need…
- A container. I recommend something dark and not too deep. If its too deep, it will be much harder to dig through as needed. Find a container that has dark sides and has a lid with some ventilation.
- There are a number of options available, I used compact bricks that expand.
- Springtail culture. Not as easy to find, you may need to do a ring around where you are, but if you know you have an aquarium store that does terrariums, they are likely to stock them. If you’re in Perth, Western Australia, head to Aquotix.
- You want to keep your cocopeat moist, but not wet. Many worm farm set ups have a drainage layer, but really that’s just the water that runs through the soil. If you don’t add as much water, you won’t have anything to drain out.
- Food scraps. We add potato and carrot peel every few days, see below for a more extensive list of do’s and don’ts.
- Most importantly, worms. I used a small local supplier for mine that gave me 100g of worms, which is around 500 worms. Other kits I found said 500 worms and castings. This means you don’t actually get as many adults early on, so you have to wait for the eggs to hatch and worms to grow. Having many more bigger worms, means you have a really good amount to get through while you wait for the next generation to grow to edible size.
That’s all you need! Once a day, I take a little container and scoop out a little tank water. I use my straight tongs to pick out worms and drop them into the water. Then use my feeding tongs to pick out the cleaned worms and feed them to the axolotls. If the cocopeat is looking a little dry, I throw the water I used for cleaning into the worm farm at the end, if not I just throw it out and put the little container back ready for the next day.
Side note; if you’re in Western Australia, you can’t get night crawlers. Most online groups will say the best worm is the night crawlers and that the red wrigglers are not as tasty. I specifically requested a mixed box so that I have other varieties, including Red wrigglers and Indian blues. However, my axolotls don’t seem to like one over the other, so they just get whichever I find on the day.
