Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am very happy today (despite the fact that I'm still trying to find a doc for my other toad *see posts below for that story*) I checked upon my toads this morning as I always do and low and behold.. EGGS! I've been waiting so long for this! I saw the couple mating before and nothing came out of that. This time he was on her for 3 days. She didn't do a very good job at keeping the eggs in the water though! She laid the strand around the water container after laying some inside the water. I'm not sure if these eggs would have had a chance to get fertilized but I carefully put them in water too. She layed these eggs sometime overnight because they weren't there the night before when I checked on them before going to bed.
How can one tell if a toad egg has been fertilized? I should be able to notice change very soon right? And what should I do with the eggs? I've moved them into another container for right now. I'm just not sure how to handle eggs since this is the first time! I've read about toad eggs a little bit but didn't pay much attention since I really thought if it hadn't happened by now that its not ever going to.. but it did! YAY! Just had to share!
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-Laurah

If they are FBTs, you will notice immediate activity. The Charcol gray centers will begin to twitch(from what I recall-over 20 years ago, I had my many clutches). They will almost look like flat worms! They will burst out of the egg in just 4 days and remain flat for only about 1 day then they will puff up and look like a tadpole as they begin to eat. I always thought it easier to remove them from the water after they hatched. But that depends on how big your water container is. So I don't know how to remove them as eggs. Start gathering the food they need. You need it in 4 days. Congrats!!!! Be ready though, more will be on the way. And they will probably lay more and more each time. The tads dirty the water fast and you have to do a little water change everyday, or they will get ill. They are voracious eaters! Feeding bloodworms always made my clutches way more hardy! Keep us posted...isn't having these lovely creatures the best???

>>If they are FBTs, you will notice immediate activity. The Charcol gray centers will begin to twitch(from what I recall-over 20 years ago, I had my many clutches). They will almost look like flat worms! They will burst out of the egg in just 4 days and remain flat for only about 1 day then they will puff up and look like a tadpole as they begin to eat. I always thought it easier to remove them from the water after they hatched. But that depends on how big your water container is. So I don't know how to remove them as eggs. Start gathering the food they need. You need it in 4 days. Congrats!!!! Be ready though, more will be on the way. And they will probably lay more and more each time. The tads dirty the water fast and you have to do a little water change everyday, or they will get ill. They are voracious eaters! Feeding bloodworms always made my clutches way more hardy! Keep us posted...isn't having these lovely creatures the best???

Whoops! I guess I forgot to mention that they are american toads. I'm hoping for more eggs and the couple that laid them are still mating, though the female doesn't look as fat as she was. I have another female that seems to be waiting by the 'pond' (as I call it). She's been hanging around as if waiting for a date, though I could be wrong. She is VERy fat also. I've taken care of tadpoles before, but when I did they were usually about 2 weeks old and I've not taken care of new hatchlings. I've seen them as hatchlings in the pond that I have - they don't even look like tadpoles! Just look like black lines that sometimes squiggle! I wasn't sure, but last night when looking at them it seemed as though I saw movement -but I might have just been mistaken. I'm hoping not though!
One thing that concerns me- Some of the eggs have white dots in the middle- Is this a rotting egg OR is it a fertilized egg? I keep looking for differences between the eggs.
Oh- and should I move all the hatchling to an aquarium? Right now I moved them into small plastic dishes (4 in total separating the eggs that were on the ground from the eggs that were actually laid in the water.)If I put them in an aquarium, how big/long should the tank be and how much water to put in it I've got an empty 30 gallon, and empty 20 gallon and 3 emtpy 10 gallons that I could use -which one would be better?
And what temperature should I strive for? I raised my toad on my back porch, but even then I think at times the water got too hot.
Were you feeding your live bloodworm or dried? I used the boiled then frozen lettuce to feed mine before but it seems like I had more defected ill tads (most I think had the malady that their arms and legs never grew and therefore could not swim or move)- which might have just been genetics (and I'm assuming so) or it might have been mal-nutrition. ??? I've heard feeding them hard boiled egg yolk or something also.
Well I've written you a book here and I'll leave it at this. I'm just so excited! Thanks for answering my post!
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-Laurah

Wow, Weee Laura, how nice for you!!! I'm afraid, I've not had experience with the Toads in question. Black squiggly lines are about right though before they begin eating. Blood worms could be fed frozen or live. I did the lettus, but I wondered too if the lettus was responsible for one clutch that had a great deal of deformities. I'd use organically grown lettus to be sure. On the tank size,(I'm back in the hobby after a 25 year sebatical-had 700 FBT tads as a kid-then my landlord "mom" kicked us all out. Had no info then, just trial and error), I can't give you a definate. Some people on this forum are much more well read then I am(so those of you in the internet generation-chime in here), but its like fish fry. They need water changes frequently. I'd change 10% of my water every day. The FBTs(again, I don't know if what I did was right or wrong, since I had no guidence-so wait for others who can confirm)I'd have in a 20 Gal or larger(clutches were 1-200 each). Believe it or not, I actually used those cheap styrophome ice chests from the supermarket. My guess is that this was not enough room for them. No one was cannabalistic and no one showed stress though(I'd call it dumb luck-if you ask me). They all were voracious, hardy and plump as can be. Course I had a ton of algae, lettus, arachnis, blood worms, fish flakes(a kid always overfeeds-never lost any due to malnutrition, only to dirty water!) Someone who knows about the Toads you have should give you an idea how long the eggs should take to hatch. This should give you a better idea if the eggs are good. If they are like FBTs then, you should see those black squiggly lines begin to twitch. Those that don't show this should be separated out. You'd want to find out the right way to remove them from the holding container and put them in the aquarium. Wish I could give you more detailed help. Congrats, at any rate, because they laid eggs you can be sure to know that they are happy!