tadpoles

D

Daddys1jenn

AC Members
May 21, 2007
100
0
0
49
TX
Ok so I have a 30 gallon pond on my back patio and frogs layed eggs in there. I thought it would be cool to watch them grow from eggs to frogs. Holy crap I didnt realize how many I would have. Anyway I am trying to find out what kind of frog it is. Here is a pic of the mom. Its getting cold outside. Should I keep them till it warms up? Any ifo on them would be nice...how should I feed them and what should I do for their housing?


DSC05431.jpg

heres a pic of tadpoles



DSC05489.jpg



.. I had put 5 in another tank and here the pic of them sitting on the landing(they are bigger since there was more room for them to grow)
DSC05492.jpg
 
First frog is a Gulf Coast Toad, Bufo (Ollotis) nebulifer; it is not the mother of your tadpoles. Tadpoles are a leopard frog, probably Southern Leopard Frog, Rana (Lithobates) sphenocephala. The tadpoles will eat algae, algae wafers, flake fish food, boiled greens, etc. The metamorphs will eat fruit flies and day-old crickets. You will probably have better survival if you wait until spring to release the frogs.

In the future please don't bring in animals if you don't intend to keep them for good. It's probably OK here, but it is possible for captive frogs to pick up nasty pathogens in captivity and spread them to their wild cousins.
 
hmm I really thought that was the mom cause thats the only frog I have seen out there. I did not no that with that little eggs that there would be that many tadpoles other wise there would of been no way I would of brought them in. They are col to watch and the kids are loving watching them get bigger
 
Yeah, they're lots of fun!

Unfortunately there are a few really nasty amphibian diseases going around these days; the main ones are ranavirus and chytrid fungus. They have wiped out whole populations and even a few species in the tropics; they have been less catastrophic in the US but are still a very serious threat. Some of the worst strains of each have come from captive populations of clawed frogs and bullfrogs.

With the density of tads in your tank you'll need to do frequent, large water changes to keep up with waste production. Upgrading to a larger tank will also help.
 
yes I do weeky changes on the tadpoles...so far so good.I live out in the country kinda so I was getting excited about being able to have more frogs jumping around come spring but wow.. this is ALOT
 
Heh. Yeah, ranid frogs are what ecologists call "r-strategists"; that is, they produce enormous numbers of offspring in the hopes that a few of them will make it by sheer luck. Tadpole mortality in the wild is extremely high; they are almost entirely defenseless and every predator that enters the water loves to gobble them down. They even feed on each other. And they often use seasonal wetlands, which have fewer predators but are more apt to dry up completely or become too hot and anoxic for larvae to survive, resulting in the loss of an entire generation. So whichever lucky frogs' egg mass you picked up, you just gave them a huge Darwinian boost.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom