Meet Red Spotted Newts

Meet my Red-spotted newts!

 Here you can see a busy newt observing me as I've been observing them :)

 Newts and I have been busy getting to know each other in this way the whole first month. 

My quest to find wild Red-spotted newts culminated on September 19th. 

Check my previous videos to see all the fun!

 I put 3 adult red-spotted newts into a 29 gallon paludarium prepared in advance. 

Newts start exploring their new home right away.

 I noticed that one of the newts is covered in something slimy. 

Here you can see it.

 All 3 newts seem to be healthy. 

I hope the water and plants with all the bacteria and who-knows-what-else that I brought with newts makes the newts feel more comfortable.

 The 3 wild newts in this tank are my primary subjects of care.

 So, I don't really worry much about contaminating fish etc with wild bacteria. 

Newts seem to be a bit disoriented at first...

 It's probably the effect of looking through the glass for the first time in life. 

The newts look very adorable. 

The first business of keeping pets is to provide them with food.

 I populated this paludarium with a breeding family of Endlers, snails and scuds. 

There were 9 different age/size fish in the tank before I put newts in. 

One month later there are more than a dozen fish - my newts don't eat the fish yet. 

I am going to share a lot of info in future videos about feeding my newts. 

For now I just want to say that my wild red-spotted newts prefer live food.

 It looks like Red spotted newts don't have any teeth.

Newts swallow the whole piece of any given food.

 So, the live food has to be sizable to fit in the mouth of the newt.

 There are no adult scuds left in the paludarium - newts eat them all in the first days. 

Now I have to set up a nursery to culture scuds as I did a couple years back for feeding my fish.

 Culturing a substantial amount of scuds for feeding 3 adult newts takes time...

 Don't worry! I have about 20 cultures of Isopods and a culture of worms.

Feeding Red-spotted newts is ...very different from feeding fish. 

Newts take time to hunt and it is very engaging to watch. 

Also, newts hunt one prey at a time.

 Feeding 3 newts is time consuming. 

Though, I already figured out a work around this problem. 

Newts often miss the targets and the prey has a chance to escape...not for too long though. 

The game is over for this Isopod. 

It is also very challenging to provide live food for newts constantly all year around. 

It is a many long years of care commitment on my part!

Red-spotted newts live up to 15-18 years in Nature going through 4 stages of development. 

I have adult Red-spotted newts in their last aquatic stage of development. 

All my newts are about 4 inch long counting the tail.

 The body is less than 2 inch long. 

One of my newts is slightly slimmer and shorter than the other two.

 But they are all mature newts that may breed. 

I don't know a sure way to gender Red-spotted newts before they start matting. 

In the Nature, Red-spotted newts start mating in Winter-Spring.

 It could be different in captivity. 

Breeding happens only if all conditions are appropriate for it. 

And I am still figuring out the feeding. 

Here a Red-spotted newt attacks a worm - and misses it! 

Caught roots of a plant instead of the worm.

 The second assault leaves not a chance for the worm.

 Worms have to be of certain sizes for feeding Red-spotted newts.

And my newts don't eat every day.

 It makes feeding simpler on one hand, but more complicated on the other hand.

 I will explain in more detail about feeding newts in future videos. 

Newts are great hunters - spending much of their time waiting motionlessly for prey.

 Newts move with the graciousness of aquatic animals and often switch to awkward walking while swimming. 

I think it's a result of newts going through 4 stages of developments through the life-cycle. 

Red-spotted newts are very active throughout the day.

 And they don't really hide - but it's hard to spot them when they stay motionlessly.

 It all makes Red spotted newts perfect pets for observations. 

Speaking of observations... 

It is very enjoyable and relaxing to watch Red-spotted newts moving around. 

Or hunting. 

I decided to keep the normal playback speed in videos about newts. 

Which makes videos much longer than I usually would make them.

 Well, that is the only way to show how cute and adorable Red spotted newts are. 

Oh yes! Red spotted newts can move lightning fast too!

 Either way, I will show it all in future videos at normal playback speed.

 Somehow, I feel very attached to Red-spotted newts from the first day. 

They seem to have different personalities. 

I have one newt - my favorite! 

Not this one - this newt is just moving funny. 

This newt just ate a worm and you can see the full belly makes it swim awkwardly :)

 I want to thank everyone for their comments and suggestions.

 Thanks to Souf Bell - I am getting polarized filters to reduce reflections in future videos.

 Have fun and happy newts :)