My salamander won't eat. Help!

[Jenny Dawn]

I got Nessie in February in her aquatic larvae stage. She morphed in late march/early april. I learned how to properly care for her through lots of research and amphibian expert who used to work at a nearby aquatic store. Everything has been going great. She has had a great appetite and will eat more than she really needs to if I let her. I try not to let her overeat but she is a bit chunky. I keep proper moisture and a water bowl, hiding places, etc. We have not had single problem till four days ago. She won't eat. I feed her large meal worms, crickets, and super worms.

The weather turned cold this week and the heater in our house is broken so it gets a bit chilly inside but the temp has never dropped below 60 inside. Could the weather be making her not want to eat? She seems fine otherwise but moving around a little less. Is it the weather? Should I bring her to vet who specializes in amphibians and reptiles? I am very attached to Nessie so i'm super worried about her. She has always had a ferocious appetite so her not eating in four days is quite odd.

[Mmfh]

What kind of salamander?

[Jenny Dawn]

What kind of salamander?

A grey tiger salamander, but she is olive in color.

[Heatheranne]

I would recommend adding either a dimmable low wattage red heat lamp or a heat pad to a side wall to keep the temp in the proper range, to aide in digestion.

Does she look constipated? Belly full or bloated? Mealworms and super worms can be hard to digest due to the chitin in their segments.

Another great place for advice is http://www.caudata.org/.

[Psychotic]

It may be due to the weather. As stated above you may want to get a low wattage heat source to boost the temps a little bit if you do not want her to brumate.

I would try feeding something other than super worms and meal worms as they aren't very nutritious and can cause blockages. You don't have to completely quite feeding them. But they really shouldn't be a staple diet. When I kept salamanders I mainly fed them chopped earth worms with a little bit of frozen blood worms and black worms (thawed of course) for variety. I only gave them crickets or roaches when I was out or running low on worms.

[Anubis]

Is there an amphibian friendly laxative you could give her to see if anything passes? I think for axolotls, as an example, it's peas (though I'm not sure how true that is). How is she doing?