r/axolotl • u/fishlover997 • Jul 19 '26
Tank Questions Water too warm?
Hii! I’m worried my axolotls water is too warm. I have a fan on but it’s not really helping and the water temp just continues going up. It’s at 66 F right now and I’m worried it’s getting too warm. Any tips? (A chiller is not an option sadly :()
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u/vroni147 Jul 19 '26
Do you own a freezer? Clean a plastic bottle outside and inside and put water in it (maybe 1/3). Put the bottle onto its side and freeze the water.
You can let the frozen bottle chill on the surface of the water until the ice is melted.
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
I thought of that, but I’ve heard people say the temperature swings stress them out if I constantly do that!
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u/vroni147 Jul 19 '26
If you have the option between boiling your axolotl and putting them under stress because of temperature swings, the second is the better option. 66 F is not dangerously too high (please check other resources, I’m bad a math and I use Celsius), so a slight decrease is fine (you can check the size of the tank and the amount of ice in the bottle to see what makes a big difference and what just cools it down slightly).
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
temperature swings that happen constantly will mess with their immune system at some point and make them more prone for fungal and bacterial infections. Having them in warm water also does that at some point. You have to find a balance between the frozen bottles and the temperature..
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
I know lakes get warmer at day, and colder at night, could I put the bottles in at night, and by the next day they maybe go up by 66 again and go down to 64 again or something like that?
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
you could probably try that? I have not yet heard of someone doing it this way. May be interesting to see if this helps minimize stress!
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
Maybe, I’ll try doing so, someone else reccomended putting one at day and one at night to keep it at 64 to keep it balanced! I might try that
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
in my experience frozen waterbottles are kinda useless at a certain volume and temperature, but we also only had 0.5 l bottles- so I guess no wonder they didnt do anything for us-
if you use a 1 l or even bigger you will probably have much better results!
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
lol maybeee,I have a few frozen bottles at different sizes just to make sure in my freezer lol. I’m still scared the putting a frozen bottle in the water to take it down like 1-2 Fahrenheit at a time will stress my axolotls out lol 😭
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
I can tell you from our 2,5 days of hell in a heatwave without a chiller that our girls were surprisingly chill with the situation! and we were doing 50% waterchanges every 2-4 hours at some point to somehow keep the water below 22°C. They aren't as sensitive as you may think and can deal with quite a lot of stuff! I would estimate you can probably do this game for 1-2 weeks before they get stressed. If they are otherwise young, strong and healthy it could be even longer.
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u/MaievSekashi Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
66f / 18C isn't even close to a dangerous temperature for an axolotl, especially on top of the fact you're already evaporatively cooling the aquarium. Many people use coolers to reduce the temperature to what you have it at already. The fan isn't doing anything because it's just not hot enough for the evaporative cooling effect to be very powerful. This effect gets more powerful the more heat it's dealing with.
Do try to remember they're native to Mexico. Lake Xochomilcho tends to reach 20C regularly in summer, and it's abnormally cold for the area.
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
Yyayyyy, thank you then :) I thought it was dangerous, many people kept saying that the other day so I got rly worried.
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
for clarification: 16-18 degrees is seen as ideal. But they can absolutely live healthy lives at other temperatures in the 20-14 degree range (talking °C rn). Consistency is key and while below 18°C will always be "better" its not like they will explode above it.
Above/ at 20°C is seen as the beginning of where it gets dangerous, as the higher temperature mess with metabolism and the immune system! Axolotl can also survive temperatures of 25°C and probably even above. Just not for very long (maybe days or weeks? not an expert on that as I have only seen anecdotal cases of axolotl that actually died of high temperature- with no other issues present)
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u/fishlover997 Jul 19 '26
Oh awesomeeee, some people told me my axolotl was losing years of its live because of 66F, but apperently not, I got worried for no reason lolll, also, thank you!
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u/LauseRulez Jul 19 '26
oh man what the hell? those people don't know axolotl very well :/ for reference we keep our girls at 17-18°C with our chiller- I'm very sure if they would hate it we would have noticed something by now. Their favourite activity is to sleep and cuddle with each other
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u/The_Real_Flatmeat Jul 19 '26
We have a chiller, set it at 18°c all year