New Dart Frogs (picture heavy)

As some of you may know Nikki and I travelled over to England last weekend to collect some new dart frogs. Here are a few pics plus a couple of two of our original frogs.

Dendrobates leucomelas




Dendrobates azureus






Dendrobates galactonotus (orange splashbacks)







Dendrobates auratus - these guys are quite nervous and hard to get a decent pic of !



Otis and Luca, two of our original frogs - Otis is a D. tinctorius 'Oyapock' and Luca is a D. leucomelas

they look brilliant! love them Blue ones! stunning!

You have an unreal collection, the blue ones are amazing mate

More amazing looking additions John. Have you got plans for these new guys?

Absolutely beautiful John. Loving those splash backs a hell of a lot although they are all amazing looking.

Wow - stunning little froggies John. You're getting quite a thing for these by the look of things!

lisafay wrote:Wow - stunning little froggies John. You're getting quite a thing for these by the look of things!

Thanks guys
yes I have wanted to keep dart frogs for years so am really enjoying building up a collection of the hardier/easier species to gain experience. They are great display animals always on the go and for most of the species (except the auratus) totally bomb proof. Looking foward to getting some pairs set up from these juveniles and who knows perhaps some eggs and babies in a year or so.

That would be pretty awesome John. Do we have nay breeders of these guys in Ireland? I wouldn't even know where to start lol

Tan wrote:That would be pretty awesome John. Do we have nay breeders of these guys in Ireland? I wouldn't even know where to start lol

Hi Tan
I think there are several people breeding Dart frogs in both the Dublin and Cork areas, haven't heard of anyone up North (Yet) The guy I got most of mine from in Engand breeds about 500 babies a year of 10 different species.
I imagine rearing the tadpoles is quite a challenge as getting small enough food when they first come out of the water is quite tricky.
John

Thanks for the info John. Yeah I never thought of that, that would be some achievement if you did manage to get them to breed. What would you even use, sea monkeys and the likes or do they not eat things like that?

Actually why would they eat seas monkeys, maybe some type of fly larvae perhaps (I'm still shattered after yesterday lol)

Hi Tan
From what I have been told from the breeder I got my frogs from while the tadpoles are in the water they eat fish food etc (even each other as apparently they can be very cannabalistic), its when they emerge from the water that getting small enough food can be a challenge. There are a number of food items which can be cultured relatively easily so I will have to have a go at those before any tadpoles come along. If Ian reads this i am sure he can add to this from his own experiences.
John

MATE THEY ARE CRACKER i cant wait to get up to your house for a good look at these

Thanks Davy you know you and Lisa are welcome any time!

Forgot to mention that Ady has some of these stunning Dart frogs in stock at the moment, great characters really and very active. For someone looking for something a bit different but not too expensive to set up or time consuming to look after these really are worth a try.
John

John, can't believe I missed this post until now! Absolute stunners, I've no doubt in your and Nichola's green fingers that you'll breed these beauties in the not to distant future.

You'll get addicted to these guys.
I'm actually a bit amazed that these have not really taken off in Ireland.

On the tadpoles, the food for the tadpoles is not THE big problem.
Tadpoles will eat almost anything alive or dead.

I feed my tadpoles fish food mainly.....spirulina flakes being a must, but a bit of JBL NovaTab is good. Also, a few freshly dead microcrickets on the water surface will do the trick.

I have 'water monkeys' (artemia) for my fish, but wouldn't use them for frogs because the artemia are raised in a very concentrated salt solution and it's too much trouble to wash them.

Where the big problem comes in is feeding freshly morphed frogs and the parents (why?)

You could go for months with a load of really healthy agile and voracious feeding tadpoles, but sometimes when they start to lose the tail....the problems kick in:
in some species spindle leg is a big problem (but not in all), and the freshly morphed froglets are often smaller than the tadpoles and will only eat living food.
In the first few days, for some species, the micro-crickets are simply too big for them to eat yet they need food pretty quickly.
You need freshly hatched springtails for some species...

In the photo below, this little guy is about 8 months since hatching, and a few weeks after morphing.....he has a newly hatched micro-brown cricket on his hear (= too big). Other species may be able to handle such a food.




I also mentioned feeding of the parents.....the problem of raising healthy babies starts with the parents. If their diet is lacking or they do not receive suffcient UV or other to provide enough vitamin D3 and calcium uptake then the tadpoles could be where you see the problem.
As I said, some species are not too much of problem with this but in others it is pretty critical.
Azureus, for example, are one of the easiest of the dart frogs to breed....yet still fetch high prices. The other tincs are pretty good for getting a decent yield of babies as well.

ian

Thanks Raymond, yes they are pretty spectacular aren't they, fingers crossed that we manage to get some pairs out of these juveniles first and hopefully then some breeding possibly next year.

As always Ian really useful information, especially at the stage we are at at the moment where we need to get the diet etc right for the juveniles to grow on into breeding adults.
John