Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello all,

I purchased a baby pacman frog about 1 month ago. She is now about 1.5 inches long I would guess. For about 3 weeks, she was eating furiously, 3 to 5 crickets on most days, occasionally taking a day off and growing very fast. For the past week, however, she has not eaten at all, even if a cricket sits directly in front of her mouth. She seems alert, and we pulled her out last night and she was hopping around and seemed ok. I've read some of the other posts here, and it seems this may be normal behaivor. I just want to confirm that everything I've set up is ok.

We have a 10 gallon aquarium, with about 1 inch thick substrate of large gravel (about .75 to 1 inch in in diameter gravel). There is water on the bottom of the tank, just enough to cover the gravel and to cover the bottom half of her when she wiggles down to the bottom of the tank. The temperature is about 80 degrees and we do weekly full water changes and gravel cleaning on the tank.

Does everything seem ok to you? Is there a chance that she could eat the large gravel?

Thank you in advance for your help.

Dave

get rid of the gravel, it is very easy for bacteria to build up in between the gravel. Also your frog could swallow some of the gravel and cause an impaction and kill the frog. Horned frogs also have very sensitive skin and the sharpe gravel could scratch the frog or irritate the skin causing an infection. I use a mixture of topsoil and orchid mulch, it seems to work very well and holds moisture well. As far as your frogs appetite it seems very normal, as long as it isn't losing weight. Mine go through spells were they won't eat for a week or two, but they'll eventually get hungry and eat again.

yep, pretty normal as mentioned watch for it losing weight, mines goes of food at times to

i agree with previous post about getting rid of the gravel, another concern i would have is that it cant burry under the gravel, i have eco earth substrate (its coconut mulch and can be found under other names like bed-a-beast). it allows the frog to sit partial burried most of the time (as they would do in the leaf litter etc in the wild) and dig right under completely from brumation or jsut to get away from it all for a couple of days lol

it means u will see the frog a bit less but ive always felt mines was happier this way, keep it fairly moist and provide a water bowl for it to soak when it wants

I would discard the gravel and start using coconut fiber substrate. If they accidentally swallow a piece of gravel, it will get stuck in the intestinal tract, causing an impaction that can be fatal to the frog. On the other hand, if some of the coco fiber is swallowed while eating, it easily passes through the digestive tract and is excreted.
Hopefully your frog has not ingested gravel. Did you notice any sticking to his last meal? At any rate, a few inches of the fiber (sold under the names bed-a-beast, forest bedding, and eco-earth) and a shallow water dish are all that are really needed.
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2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Ashes, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache Fog
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

Thank you for the advice.

I changed the substrate this morning and added bed a beast. He has always buried himself in the gravel, and now that I look more closely, it seems that some of his arms and legs look a little raw (probably from rubbing on the gravel). However, when I removed him from his home for the cleaning, he did look very alert, hopped around a bit, and looked upset that I was disturbing him. So, he does appear ok.

The gravel in his tank were fairly large, almost the length of his body. I examined him closely, and if he did in fact swallow the gravel, I think I would notice.

Thank you for your advice. Let me know if there is anything else I should look out for. I will post some pictures soon.

Dave