African Dwarf Frog advice

[cawaltons]

I purchased a pair of ADFs yesterday. The LFS said the dark one was a male and the light one was a female. After reading Leopardess' article on ADFs, I'm not so sure that's right. SOunds like the differences are more subtle.

Also, I am wondering about feeding the frogs the frozen bloodworms. The LFS said to just drop the frozen cube in there. Yesterday, it fell to the bottom and somehow wound up under the wood. Today, it was gone. I am wondering if the frogs ate it or if it could have thawed and disappeared into the substrate? Other suspects are my betta, ghost shrimp and a bushy nose pleco. Do you think one cube a day (as suggested by the LFS) or every other day?

I think I will thaw the cube today. I don't know about doing the tweezer feeding since the frogs are just hiding under the wood.

There is a slit in the back of our hood for the filter. Do you really think this should be taped? Leopardess seemed sure they will try to jump out. Hard to imagine such timid things being that active.

Thanks!

 

[Harlock]

I would certainly thaw the cube before feeding it to them. Just use a little tank water and swirl it around until everything is dissolved. Also, I would allow a little more time after that to let the worms thaw throughout. Lots of folks worry about their frogs eating, and tease feeding with tweezers seems a way to alleviate the worry and know if they are eating or not. As for the slit, I would tape it up, just in case. Better safe than sorry.

 

[msp75]

A whole cube for 2 frogs every day? I guess it depends on the size of the cube (off topic, but I wish I could find tiny cubes somewhere!) I don't feed my pair that often. Their bellies are still pretty round the day after a feeding, so I feed them 1 cube (fully thawed in tank water) every other day or so. The rasboras in the tank get a few of the worms as they sink, but most of it lands on the bottom and goes to the frogs. My frogs get plenty and stop eating when they're full, but I know some people like to tweezer feed to make sure the ADFs are able to get to the food before someone else. My frogs are the only bottom dwellers I have and are pretty active, so I don't worry about that.

I would definitely cover the slit in the hood. At least in my experience, they may be timid at first but not for long! Mine explore and swim all over the place and especially love to sit at the top on tall plants. I think they would try to get out if they could.

 

[cawaltons]

freshly thawed bloodworms -- yum!

We're going to cover the slit.

Thawed the bloodworms. The betta and the neons enjoyed them, leaving a large clump to fall to the bottom. The frogs are in the opposite corner of the tank, naturally, and haven't come near them. I don't know if they've eaten anything. They haven't learned to associate me with food yet. I think I'll just feed a blood worm cube every other day, and put in pellets and flakes for the other fish on the alternate days.

Funny, my pleco was bumping into one of the frogs as he munched on a green bean and the frog could hardly bother to move.

Thanks for the input!