Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I work at a childcare center with the school age group, a few months ago our class pet passed away. We are know ready to get a new pet and the children would like to get a frog. My question is what species would be best suited and the easiest to care for? Thank you for any imput.

It depends on if there is handling involved. YOu could go with an African Clawed Frog, it lives in the water it's whole life and could be housed in a 10 gallon aquarium set up how you would set up for fish. Or a Green Treefrog you could keep it in a 10 gallon aquarium as well. Or a frog that can tolerate a little bit of handling a Whites' Treefrog, which would live in a 20 gallon aquarium. but I would suggest something a little more people friendly like a Leopard Gecko or a Bearded Dragon, the gecko could live in a 10 gallon aquarium and the dragon a 30 -40 gallon aqurium. Both are very entertaining to watch at feeding time. And may be handled more than frogs.

i would reccomend a FBT they are easy to care for. but there water has to be changed atleast every 3 days. then a good cleaning every 2 weeks to a month.

im not familar with the care of tree frogs, habitar wise they should be easier to clean up after. but i would not reccomend holding the frog. the only time i touch mine is when i am moving them to a temporary tank when i clean their main tank.

and depending on how loud the room is and how accessable the tank is to kids, it might stress any frog out. they are sensative to loud sounds and lots a gigantic hands coming at them is terrifing it took my fbts around 2 weeks to go to the edge of the glass when i came by. before that they would always jump off and hide.

aj
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kungfu28181: My god. You are insane. -Mon Jun 30 21:41:05

Hi,

If you are looking for a pet that the children can interact with and handle you might not want to go for any kind of amphibian. Amphibians have very sensative skin. The oils in human hands irritate them and handling frogs often can kill them. If you are looking for a class pet that the kids can learn from and watch then a frog would be great.

A few species that you might want to look into are fire-bellied toads, whites tree frogs, green tree frogs, and horned frogs. Those species are very hardy and tend to be able to put up with many mistakes that are common when someone is just starting out with amphibians. If it were me I would pick the fire-bellied toads because they are very colorful and active and would probably be a lot more fun to watch than a sleeping tree frog (they are nocturnal animals) or an inactive horned frog. Good luck,
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Devin
devin@amphibiancare.com
www.amphibiancare.com

I agree with everything, but I don't think that green tree frogs would make a good choice at all for this. Although they're hardy, I do think that they'd be easily stressed by a room full of kids looking at them and tapping on the glass.

Then again, people keep leos in classrooms, and they're much more easily spooked! But for the sake of the animal, I think you should stay away from the smaller, more spookable, frogs. It would also be less likely for the frog (if it's a tree frog you choose) to escape it's environment (remember--class full of kids!), and either get lost or stepped on.

Remember that the amount of money that can be spent on this and the air temperature and the humidity in the room will matter on what you get. I hope you find the best animal and that your kids are very happy about it!

I would go with the African clawed frog. They are much like fish, and since kids probably know they can't hold fish, they will not hold the frog. They are personable, do not hide often, and can grow fairly large. They are readily available, especially through educational centers and schools who work with biological suppliers (such as nasco). You could even get tadpoles and raise them until they reach froglet size, showing the kids the different steps of development. Andy
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Andy Maddox
Houston Herp Key
The Reptizone

Who are you who can say it's ok to live through me? Alice In Chains

I agree with african clawed frogs as a good choice. They are easy to feed; with most frogs, you have to use live crickets, but this kind will accept fish food-like foods, such as dehydrated tubifex worm squares. They are very entertaining while they eat.
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*~Ginevive~*

My 2 cents is: Start with basics, what you can see commonly around the area. As long as you keep in mind that they're for show and not for petting. I started off as a 7 yrd kid with green frogs, leopards, and then bullfrogs. To me, ranids are THE traditional frogs that someone can go to a pond as a child and scoop up to watch the development from egg to tadpole to froglet. I mean, as long as you're not capturing endangered species or focused only on exotics, I think it's alright to just keep kids entertained with a "plain" native common frog. They're hardy, easy to maintain (yes a bullfrog will need an elaborate setup once grown..before somebody goes off on a rant about how they're so destructive), and do what frogs do--catch bugs with their sticky tongues and ribbit at night. Then again, with all the current popularity with FBT, clawed, Whites Treefrogs, etc and the surplus of good information out there, I guess a lot of them are all good beginner pets. Shell in some cash, set up a terrarium, and let the kids marvel. =) Gluck!