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A two-part question, really; I apologize if this is long :}

I had two leopard frog tadpoles. One metamorphosed into a frog rather quickly; I fed it crickets while still feeding the other tadpole those little tadpole-bite things. Unfortunately, someone in my family accidentally left a lotion bottle on top of the aquarium; some of the lotion dripped into the tank and the frog died. Amazingly, the other tadpole lived. However, since then, it has developed its back legs but has shown absolutely no sign of developing any further. It is healthy and eats readily, but has remained at the hind-legs-only phase for at least six months now. Is there any way I can induce further development? I believe that I read somewhere that I can lightly "stress" the tadpole to encourage it to develop, but I'm not sure how to do this without harming it. Any advice would be appreciated.

Also, my neighbor keeps two leopard frogs and several African Dwarf frogs together in a large aquarium. Is this safe? The two species are about the same size, and he feeds them bloodworms.

Thanks!

Well your neighbor will wake up one day with only 2 frogs left in that aquarium, because the Leopard Frogs will eat the Dwarf Frogs, unless he told you wrong and they are African Clawed Frogs, in which case they will eat the Leopard frogs. So to answer that question no it is not safe for the frogs. And as for your tadpole just let it develope as it sees fit, it already has enough stress with turning into a frog.

I have read that both reducing feeding and lowering the water level can hasten the metamorphosis in some species of frogs, but i have no idea if this would do anything at all for leopard frogs. however, i am inclined to take the passive route on this one.
-kyle
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[signature edited to remove advertising]

Edited on December 20, 2003 at 19:52:08 by phwyvern.

If you still have the same problem, try raising the temperature a few degrees and see if it does anything. I raised some southern leopard frogs from tads and it does sound strange that metamorphasis would take so long.

Found this, if it helps:

"The sex hormones that control reproduction and development in humans control many of the same functions in frogs. The effects are most critical to both species during early development. For example, some tadpoles exposed to androgens never develop into adults. "If you saw them in the field," says Hayes, "they look like big healthy tadpoles, but they never develop into frogs. The hormone inhibits their thyroid gland so they're stuck in the tadpole stage.""

"On the bottom, a normal tadpole. The one on top has been exposed to the human hormone androgen, and will never develop into a frog. [Click for a larger image.] Photo courtesy of Dr. Tyrone Hayes. "

and a picture http://www.exploratorium.edu/frogs/researcher/images/tadpoles_lrg.jpg

on exploratorium.edu

In pet stores, leopard frog tadpoles are often mixed in with green frog tadpoles which take much longer to mature (up to two years) and stay in the hind-leg stage for quite some time, Could this be the situation?