Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey everyone,

About 2 weeks ago my Auratus laid eggs, I was surprised to see that one night one was transporting a tadpole to the little pond I have built into the terrarium. Just yesterday I noticed there are 3 little black tadpoles in there! I was just amazed and have been so excited. I don't want to touch anything because I think if they've done it this long, I will let nature run it's course. I have been sprinkling a little tadpole food once a day. Is there anything else I need to know about raising little(er) ones??

Thanks!
Justin
-----
1.0 Picasso panther chameleon (Pablo)
1.0 D. Tinctorius (Cobalt V.)
0.1.1 D. Auratus
0.0.1 Golddust Day Gecko

Auratus tadpoles are cannibalistic, you may want to remove the tadpoles and harvest future eggs. If you leave the 3 tadpoles in the pond area you may lose 2, but you will at least now that the tadpole that morphs will be the strongest one.

Interesting. Thanks for the reply. Do you know if tincs are canabalistic too? Will they eat each other even if they are getting fed every day?
-----
1.0 Picasso panther chameleon (Pablo)
1.0 D. Tinctorius (Cobalt V.)
0.1.1 D. Auratus
0.0.1 Golddust Day Gecko

Auratus are part of the "tinc" group. Tinc tads are also cannibalistic. you may not experience any cannibalism with your tads, but for reference they are known cannibals.

If you feed them a good protien source and the water area isn't too small then cannibalism tends to only occur occasionally (and may simply be the result of seeing the other tads feeding on a dead sibling).
If I am rearing tads in a group I keep some live blackworms in with the tads and this helps prevent cannibalism.
Many of the foods people feed the tads are very heavy in algae and vegetation that does not give them access to animal protiens.
Unless you are going to try and produce a ton of tadpoles, you can let the parents care for the eggs and just pull and rear the tadpoles. This will reduce reproductive stress on the female and reduce the risk of spindly leg as the female has more time to rebuild vitamin and mineral reserves between clutches.
It also ensures that you are continuing to breed frogs that still have thier natural behaviors (if all clutches are pulled and the frogs cannot tend the eggs and transport tadpoles we are exerting a pressure to evolve frogs that do not show parental behaviors).

Ed