Reptile & Amphibian Forums

my 15 yo son was given one of these last week he's still a baby but i don't really know how to care for it .i mean what doeas it really need? we figure a heat lamp since it's starting to get chilly here,but what else?

is this even a frog i should have w/ kids as young as 6yo?
HELP ,I'D HATE TO SEE SOMETHING HAPPEN TO THIS FROG.BUT WERE FROG STUPID IF U KNOW WHAT I MEAN.
THANKS,
KELLY

pacmans need to be relatively warm, about 80F. i keep my pacmans on wet paper towels. this is the cleanest. it is very easy to see when it is dirty and needs to be changed. it also has almost no risk of impaction(stuff being swallowed and backing up his digestive system). it is also pretty easy for them to burrow into. if you dont like the look of paper towels, the only other thing i would put them on is bed-a-beast. it comes in the form of a brick that you soak in water and it expands. it is fine grained and i have not had any problems with impaction. if you go with this method you will need a shallow, but wide water dish. keep water in it at all times but also keep the bed-a-beast moist, but not wet. a ten gallon is all it will need when full grown. for heat a low wattaged daylight bulb, not heat bulb, will give adequate heat. these bulbs are shaped like regular house bulbs, but usually have light blue glass. place the light at one end of the tank so the frog can pick what area of the tank is the right temp for him. what are you feeding it? variety is the key. crickets and other store bought bugs should be good for him. i would start to add pinkies to the menu once it is about 2 inches long.

hey so you're saying just wet-how wet, how many paper towels?he's everybit of 2 inches now.what's a pinkie? the kids have been catching crickets, beetles grasshoppers,but it's starting to get chilly here in va. and harder to find.

also just one of those light bulbs? no heat lamp etc? do u leave the light on 24 hrs a day or just 12? do we start out w/ a 10gallon or just satart off w/ 5 gallon? he's like in a small carrier type thing now so there's not that much room.
do we need to worry about giving him water out of the faucet?
thanks for the info,anything else i need to know would sure be appreciated.

kelly

im in va too, what area are you in? 12 or so hours of light a day. i keep it pretty wet, so if it tilt the cage some collects at the low end real quick. i use a layer of paper towels about half an inch thick. i dont like to get things from outside, or even around the house, because you dont know what they have been eating. even if you dont use fertilizers or pesticides, your neighbors might and all those bugs could be full of toxic chemicals. buying from the pet store is MUCH better and safer than catching. a pinky is a baby mouse. it sounds bad at first so if you are not comfortable feeding this to him you may want to have someone else in the house do it. it is not necessary if it is that uncomfortable for you, but i have gotten the best growth when feeding pinkies and other appropriately sized rodents. other food items are nightcrawlers, tadpoles, feeder fish no longer than him. remember all should be store bought , not wild caught. there is a product called reptisafe that should make the tap water safe for him. however my cousin had problems even when using this product because his city tap was so bad and ended up killing 2 frogs that i had going for over a year. if you are on city water i would suggest using room temp spring water, not distilled, just buy big store brand jugs from whatever store you use. this is cheap and very safer than hoping the reptisafe is enough. if you are on well water you may not have to use anything, i dont. go ahead and start him in a 10 gallon, you will need it eventually and there is no need to buy 2 tanks. for the light bulb: get a heat dome lamp that goes up to 50 or 60 watts. this way even if the daylight bulb isnt quite hot enough, you can change to a heat bulb without having to buy a new fixture for it. the lamp should sit rigth on top of the screen on one end of the tank. if the guy(or gal) at whatever pet shop you go to tries to tell you "thats not right" or "you should get this too" he is mistaken or is trying to upsell you. these are the methods i have used to get my ornate pacman to 6" when most books say they max out at 5". i used a lot more rodents in the diet than most people suggest and have not had any problems yet.

hey i'm here in richmond-technically chesterfield county so were not on city water.
it didn't even occur to me that catching the outdoors type that they could get into stuff.now i thought he was 2 inches but my husband said only about an inch-like does it really make that much of a differnce?

my kids would proably enjoy feeding mice to that thing -not me. when you feed them like the little guppies do u put them in the water dish or just toss them in there and wait for him to eat it?
i'll go ahead and get the bottled water for him,her.
do they like the freezedried bugs or only prefer the ''live'' things?
well i'm sure i'll have more questions for you sure am glad you know about this frog.too bad we didn't get him at the beginning of summer-he'd been one happy frog with it being as hot as it was.

kel

i thought you were going to use paper towels, in which case you dont need a water dish. if you already have a water bowl you can put it in there, it wont hurt anything. zoomed makes these little yellow feeding tongs. i dont feed guppies, i would feed small goldfish or rosey reds. i just grab the middle of the fish with the tongs and then either drop it in front of him and as it wiggles it will trigger him to go for it, or if he doesnt i pick it up again and rub it along his mouth which triggers him to bite it at which point he realizes, this is good, and eats it. the best thing for fish is to have a small tank(2.5 gallon) to keep them in and feed as needed. feed the fish well because most pet stores dont feed them well, if at all. they usually only take live, and im not sure how nutritional those freeze dried things are. use the tongs whenever you need to do something around him, because if he bites them, no big deal, if he bites you or your kids people usually jerk back real quick which can hurt the frog. if bitten keep your hand still and let him try to eat it, he will realize he cant and then release you . this may take a few minutes, but just sit and wait. you may be able to speed this along by rubbing his nose with the flat part of your fingernail, not the tip. putting them under water or running hot or cold water over them will get them to release as well, but this is more stressful for the frog than letting him figure out he cant eat you. it hurts a little, but isnt too bad. once he releases wash your hands really well, preferably with an alcohol based disinfectant. there is a reptile water-less hand sanitizer called 'wipe out 3' that is good to use after every time you handle him or his cage, or if he bites. when i handle mine i get my hands wet with her water, from behind her if if i can, if i cant than i get it from far ahead of her, too far for her to try and bite me from, and then i come from straight above so she knows its not food and cant bite me. then i just pick her up. avoid fingers touching him around his mouth, as this may prompt him to try and bite them. for his size, go ahead and measure him with a ruler if you can. i have had nickel sized pacmans take pinkies, which are about an inch long, without problems. but i would not recommend it since it really is pushing it. just have your kids set the pinky in front of the frog with the tongs, or if he doesnt take it, have them rub the pinkies head on the frogs mouth using the tongs, same as the fish. you or your husband should watch, at least the first few times, to make sure the kids arent sticking their fingers in there, teach them what to do if they ever do get bitten. unless your kids are teenagers they should not ever handle him, either you or your husband needs to pick him up so the kids can clean the cage. even teenagers should be shown how to do it right. remember to re-enforce that everyone needs to disinfect their hands before and after handling the frog. this ensures you dont get him sick from whatever you were doing before you handled him, and you dont get sick from handling him.

hey i have more ?'s but right now we can't seem to find the frog in his little tank.i know they like to burrow but we haven't seen him in over 24 hrs now.
the kids knocked him over the other night by accident and i'm sure it scared him but should i try and find him or just let him come out when he's ready?
thanks
kel

just gently dig through a little at a time so even when you do find him it wont scare or bother him too much. he didnt come out when it was knocked over did he?

apparently he was out when he got knocked over,but we found him,cleaned up his cage and he seems ''happy'' now. he is only like a 1'' long so i guess we'll wait to start feeding him the fish and pinkies.

you could try some small rosey reds. he should be able to handle those just fine. that is if you have another tank to put the fish on. with a small filter.

ok then we'll get some of those.we have fish tanks b/c my husband loves fish anyway ,we did have a nice 150 gallon salt water tank and the smaller tanks so thats easy enough to take care of.

this little guy sure does grow on ya after awhile,if anyone ever told me we'd have a frog i'd of told them they were nuts.the lizards look intersting too.

what type of lizard? remember that the best way to feed live fish is to keep them in the fish tank for at least a week to get them well fed and observe for any signs of disease. most people feed as soon as they get them home and keep extras in the fish tank until they are needed. this is usually okay but the other way is the most ideal method. you never know what is in the pet shops tanks, especially their feeder tanks. and most pet shops dont feed their feeders, which means they are malnourished, and whatever is or isnt in the fish is what goes in the frog.

we need to check out lizards but i like the big ones,u know like the ones u could put a little lizard leash on and let him hang out w/ ya -as long as the dogs r outdoors.
i guess we'll just get those and fatten them up for a while b/f we give it to mr. frog.

i have had a number of savanna moniotrs. those are probably what you are looking for. big, but not as aggressive as most other monitors. when handled from babies they are very tame. however even the nicest one could mistake fingers for food, especially if they smell food, and an adult could take off fingers. how old is your youngest son? this may be a limiting factor unless all your kids are very good about following the rules, which you would have to strictly enforce, even when the monitor was a baby.

my youngest is 6 and i didn't know they could bite off fingers,i can see it nowfingers laying all over the floor.well i guess thats something new to think about. we'd still like one i guess we'd just have to make sure the kids left him alone or would follow the rules.
i know years ago a friend of ours had one but he got rid of it for some reason,come to think of it i think he was a bit mean but he didn't get it as a baby maybe thats why.
this board is great i can find loads of info.need to check out the dog section and see if anyone has any tips for our epileptic st. bernard, we use natural remidies for him.

i can tell you from experience, if i didnt grab one right behind the head when it bit me, i would be missing the last section of my index finger and thumb. even if they couldnt get your fingers, they could definitely get yours sons'. i have nephews who averaged your youngest's age when i had my savannas. i mounted locks on the cage and kept it padlocked at all times.

yeah i think we'll put off getting a lizard,i think mr.frog will be challenging enough for the time being.

hey ,i have another question for u, is it normal for him to want to stay in his water dish? we have the damp paper towels in there too but also the water dish .the towels just dry out so quick,it stays a constant 80 degrees in his tank.

thanks,
kelly

a lot of them do that. i wouldnt worry. whatever makes him happy.

have another question for ya - i don't think he's eating the crickets we put in there seem to keep dying even though they have food -mealworms which we thought he might eat,or maybe he just eats and were not aware of it.

we haven't done the fish thing yet b/c we have a salt water fish tank, do they eat any salt water fish? do they like the meal worms? he seems like he's a bit picky ???

saltwater fish would probably be really bad for them. i dont like to feed mealworms because they are harder to digest, and there is the argument on whether they eat up the insides of whatever eats them, which i think they at least could chomp up the insides a little on their way to the stomach. what are you feeding the crickets. use a llot of varieyt, apples, potatoes, oranges, orange cubes(a commercial cricket diet), all sorts of different stuff. also give the crickets somewhere to hangout if you are leaving themin the cage with him. i like to use just a cheap, fine-leafed aquarium plant, they will hangout on it instead of all over the frog, which can lead to them nibbling on the frog(at least in some people's opinion). if you wanted you could even try a born-last-night pinky from a pet shop, if they have any, but as i said before it may not be good to rush them onto big food items like pinkies.

ok, had to go back to the pet store anyway,we now own a guinea pig so i will find some variety for the crickets,i didn't know that about the meal worms.

thanks
kel

you dont know what about the mealworms? i love guinea pigs, great pet rodent, only better pet rodent is a rat. th epet shop i am working at is supposed to get a breeding pair of guinea pigs so we can make our own, get people interested while they are still tiny.

i thought those meal worms were a little hard now that u brought it up.well cool if you're an expert on guinea pigs i need info on them too.the people were getting him from have a daughter who just terrorizes animals[proably the next serial killer] she loves to b mean 2 animals and they'll get a dog get tired of it and trade it in for another.

they're getting rid of this gp b/c they don't want any more babies.i think this one is about 1 or 2yo and he's just as friendly as he can be, other than that i don't know anything about them.

ill try and write a care sheet for them in the next day or two, and send it to you first.

THANKS.

do you have an email i can send it to? it is 2 pages and i dont think anyone else here wants to read it.

yeah it's:
spenditalltoday@netscape.net

thanks again

if your still looking for a big lizard, look into blue tongue skinks.

hey are those lizards good around kids?

http://allaboutfrogs.org/info/species/horned.html

(i dont use the reptibark anymore)