Freckles is our axolotl. My mom bought Freckles for Tabitha in 2016 because she said Tabitha needed her and Tabitha agreed! When Tabitha brought her home, Freckles was just a couple of inches long with her face covered in freckles. Now, she’s around ten inches long and, as she got older, her freckles have faded.
Housing
Freckles lives in a forty-gallon breeder aquarium. The breeder aquarium is wider than a standard forty-gallon tank so it gives Freckles more floor space to move around. We clean her tank every week since it gets messy quickly because she can’t have gravel in her tank to collect uneaten food bits. She has a filter in the tank, but since she needs her water to be cold we don’t use a heater.
Water Temperature
Having the water temperature too high can kill her so during summer we float gallon-sized baggies full of ice in her tank to lower the temperature. We’ll be getting her an aquarium fan to cool the water instead of having to use ice. During winter we keep the house at sixty-two degrees so her water stays the perfect temperature because of the surrounding air temperature. If the water becomes too cold, we turn on her tank heater just until the temperature warms up a little.
Algae Control
We put a hornwort plant in her tank to help with algae control and to give her a little snack. Hornwort inhibits the growth of algae and we’ve seen great results in Freckles’ tank since using it.
Food
We feed Freckles a specially formulated axolotl food. It’s ordered from a lady out of state who makes it herself and Freckles has been thriving since we started feeding it to her. She has a playful personality and when we drop her food into her tank, she’ll swim over to it and let it drop onto her head. She loves her food hats!
