Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have 10 American toad tadpoles/toadlets, and while the tadpoles do fine on boiled spinach, algae and commercial pellets, I'm not sure if all the nutritional needs of the toadlets are being met by aphids. These tiny insects are the easiest for me to collect, but do the toads need more variety? They seem to be doing fine and eating well so far.

I don't think that they will grow so good on them anyways. They will end up eating like a couple thousand a day when older if not more.

When I had toadlets of that species I fed them crickets. I fed them about 1-2 small crix every day until they got about an inch or so big and went to the medium sized crix and fed them 3 crix every day. And when they got bigger I fed them 5-7 adult crix and every other day I fed them 3-4 superworms.

I got 2 adult American Toads now and I feed them the 5-7 adult crix and every other day I feed them the 3-4 superworms each.

Oh, I wasn't planning to feed them aphids all their lives! That'd be waaaaay too much work and unhealthy to boot. I was just wondering if the toadlets can eat aphids until their mouths are large enough for other food, like small crickets. These toads are pinky-fingernail-size (~4mm) right now, so even pinhead crickets are a little big.

Plus, my friendly neighboorhood pet shops don't usually stock pinheads. Are flightless drosophila cultures easy to manage?

It would be fine to feed them aphids, just somehow put some vitamin dust on them every other feeding.

I've never had the flightless fruit flies or anything like that. I've heard though that their easy to breed and take care of. SO I would try get some if possible but the aphids are fine.