My Pacman Frog eats DRY fish food sticks, is this heathly and can I maintain him on this diet?

[skippy]

Hello!

This is what he just started eating for me: (I tong feed him crickets and hornworms otherwise)

Nutrafin Max Predator Sticks:

The info I found on it:

Ingredients
Earthworm meal, krill, fish meal, corn meal, soy protein concentrate, squid meal, corn gluten meal, shrimp meal, salmon oil (ethoxyquin used as preservative), wheat flour, fish liver meal, dried yeast, dried kelp, dried potato products; rice bran, vitamins (cholecalciferol, biotin, d-calcium pantothenate, folic acid, inositol, niacin supplement, riboflavin-5-phosphate, calcium L-ascorbyl-2-monophosphate, vitamin A acetate, thiamine hydrochloride, vitamin B12 supplement, pyridoxine hydrochloride, vitamin E supplement, menadione sodium bisulfite complex (source of vitamin K activity)), DL methionine, choline chloride, minerals (manganous oxide, ferrous carbonate, zinc oxide, copper oxide, calcium iodate, cobalt carbonate, calcium carbonate), yeast extract, fructooligosaccharide, dried seaweed meal, lecithin, citric acid; Guarenteed Analysis: Crude protein Min. 45%; Crude fat Min. 10%; Crude fiber Max. 1.3%; Moisture Max. 7%; Ash Max. 9%; Calcium Min. 0.75%; Phosphorus Min. 0.75%; Copper Min. 20 ppm; Cobalt Min. 0.1 ppm; Iron Min. 350 ppm; Iodine Min. 1 ppm; Manganese Min. 10 ppm; Zinc Min. 50 ppm; Vitamin A Min. 10,000 IU/lb; Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) Min. 350 mg/lb; Vitamin E Min. 50 IU/lb

Can I feed this to my frog? I dip one end in calcium dust after soaking the stick in water for a few minutes. He eats 3-4 of these sticks every night. They are just under an inch long.

What do you think? I don't want to feed something that's bad for him, but I find this much more palatable than crickets (on my part I mean)?

Can these replace crickets, or is the fat content too high, or does something else in the ingredients look fishy (pardon the pun) ??

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

This is him by the way:

Albino Pac Man Frog in a 10 gallon tank - update #2 - YouTube


Thanks for the help in advance!

[skippy]

Anyone?

I really want to know if id be hurting my frog on this diet in the long run or short term even?

[ramp]

Don't be stupid. Sticks are to dry. The intention of a feeder stick is to float on water and then ABSORB WATER, lots of it to sink. I wouldn't ever feed something like this to a frog. Perhaps if you soak it and form a ball from it like "Samurai" does, you could give it as a treat once in a while, if the ingrediants and vitamins are in balance, wich I'm not sure of. You'd better ask an expert on this mather.
Becides sticks as I said absorb water, wich can not be good for the frogs intestents I believe.

[GrifTheGreat]

I recommend you find a better food source for your frog. This is not a food item designed to be eaten whole. You may cause an impaction in your frogs digestive tract if the sticks are not soft enough and absorb moisture from inside the frog causing the sticks to swell. If it were crunched up and made into a soft ball then MAYBE as a treat now and then.

[skippy]

well, i do soak them. they are pretty much mush when he eats them.

im not stupid by the way.

[skippy]

I recommend you find a better food source for your frog. This is not a food item designed to be eaten whole. You may cause an impaction in your frogs digestive tract if the sticks are not soft enough and absorb moisture from inside the frog causing the sticks to swell. If it were crunched up and made into a soft ball then MAYBE as a treat now and then.

why not eaten whole? Don't fish eat them whole?

[GrifTheGreat]

why not eaten whole? Don't fish eat them whole?

Post a pic of what the sticks look like. They're made for fish not frogs so there could possibly be something in the vitamin balance that isn't properly balanced for a frog which can be detrimental to the frog over time.

[GrifTheGreat]

Don't be stupid. Sticks are to dry. The intention of a feeder stick is to float on water and then ABSORB WATER, lots of it to sink. I wouldn't ever feed something like this to a frog. Perhaps if you soak it and form a ball from it like "Samurai" does, you could give it as a treat once in a while, if the ingrediants and vitamins are in balance, wich I'm not sure of. You'd better ask an expert on this mather.
Becides sticks as I said absorb water, wich can not be good for the frogs intestents I believe.

Ramp that was uncalled for and not necessary. That is not how you answer someone's question. Not everyone here knows what can and can't be Fed to their frogs. I'm certain there is no article or literature to answer this question otherwise this person wouldn't be asking us. Try to be more helpful rather than insulting please.

[ramp]

Ramp that was uncalled for and not necessary. That is not how you answer someone's question. Not everyone here knows what can and can't be Fed to their frogs. I'm certain there is no article or literature to answer this question otherwise this person wouldn't be asking us. Try to be more helpful rather than insulting please.

Sorry Grif, wasn't meant to be insultive, what I meant was exactly what you wrote but couldn't find the rigth words. Certainly dry food can mess up the intestines of a frog and many other amphibious creatures, sometimes even fish. Ill take care to write it down better in future.

[IvoryReptiles]

Take a close look at the ingredients in the Samurai powder and you will find it is very similar to the sticks. You can use the sticks soaked to a firm softness as a food for them. I would stick (pun intended!) to Nightcrawlers as the main food source, but you can certainly supplement them this way.

As for dry foods messing up a frog's intestines (correct spelling, by the way) That is a possibility, but I wonder who is out in the wild making sure those hard bones get yanked out of every animal they eat.

Sorry, Grif knows me well enough to know that I can't stand people who act as though they know it all and have since birth. Stupid is an ugly word......uglier still when it's thrown out there in a nasty manner. If you can't find civilized words to express yourself, I suggest you not post at all.

Diets are debatable for these frogs because no research has seriously been done in the scientific community. We learn as we go. We've been breeding for 5 years and we don't know it all by a long shot!! We learn daily.

[ramp]

Take a close look at the ingredients in the Samurai powder and you will find it is very similar to the sticks. You can use the sticks soaked to a firm softness as a food for them. I would stick (pun intended!) to Nightcrawlers as the main food source, but you can certainly supplement them this way.

As for dry foods messing up a frog's intestines (correct spelling, by the way) That is a possibility, but I wonder who is out in the wild making sure those hard bones get yanked out of every animal they eat.

Sorry, Grif knows me well enough to know that I can't stand people who act as though they know it all and have since birth. Stupid is an ugly word......uglier still when it's thrown out there in a nasty manner. If you can't find civilized words to express yourself, I suggest you not post at all.

Diets are debatable for these frogs because no research has seriously been done in the scientific community. We learn as we go. We've been breeding for 5 years and we don't know it all by a long shot!! We learn daily.

I already apologised for the way I wrote the reply. It was not my intension to hurt or insult anyone.
Hhere is an american brand of dry pelleted food available for aquatic frogs and newts and I found that when feeding this to frogs or newts for a long time, it gives intestinal problems and more.
I don't know it all, certainly not from birth. What I do know is that I've been keeping and breeding several species of reptiles and amphibians for more than 25 years now. Due to health reasens I had to slow down. And would like to concentrate on the Ceratophrys group if I may. I hoped to get in contact with others who chared my passion but one bad choise of words makes me a ... well never mind

[IvoryReptiles]

I already apologised for the way I wrote the reply. It was not my intension to hurt or insult anyone.
Hhere is an american brand of dry pelleted food available for aquatic frogs and newts and I found that when feeding this to frogs or newts for a long time, it gives intestinal problems and more.
I don't know it all, certainly not from birth. What I do know is that I've been keeping and breeding several species of reptiles and amphibians for more than 25 years now. Due to health reasens I had to slow down. And would like to concentrate on the Ceratophrys group if I may. I hoped to get in contact with others who chared my passion but one bad choise of words makes me a ... well never mind

Not at all.........it makes your choice of words a mistake that you apologized for. Not jumping or riding you, just stated what I did for others to learn from too. We have ALL done it at least 5 times in our lives.......pretty sure I have done it more.
My Husband & I have been working with reptiles for over 15 years each. We started breeding the cranwelli a few years back and they were our first attempt at breeding amphibians. It has been exciting & enriching experience. We have never had any issues with feeding the carnivorous frog food or newt bites to our frogs. We do always either grind it up in a spice grinder (dedicated to that purpose) and add water to make a dough-like substance to tong feed them balls of it.

I am sorry if I came across as rude ramp, didn't mean to be. We make mistakes and we learn from them. It helps if we help each other along the way too.

[ramp]

Not at all.........it makes your choice of words a mistake that you apologized for. Not jumping or riding you, just stated what I did for others to learn from too. We have ALL done it at least 5 times in our lives.......pretty sure I have done it more.
My Husband & I have been working with reptiles for over 15 years each. We started breeding the cranwelli a few years back and they were our first attempt at breeding amphibians. It has been exciting & enriching experience. We have never had any issues with feeding the carnivorous frog food or newt bites to our frogs. We do always either grind it up in a spice grinder (dedicated to that purpose) and add water to make a dough-like substance to tong feed them balls of it.

I am sorry if I came across as rude ramp, didn't mean to be. We make mistakes and we learn from them. It helps if we help each other along the way too.

All I ment to say was; "Please don't feed the dry pellets as it CAN couse problems". And yes I sometimes make a mistake in spelling, All day I have to be ready to speak, read and write 4 different languages, so I sometimes mess up. As I said somewhere, I work at an importer of reptiles and amphibians as head of animals (not to brag, believe me) and started as a simple employee at the same firm, taking care of all kinds of critters. I bred Mantella species, so long ago, in the time when they still all were called species and didn't have avalid name.
I learned a lot a long the way, mostly from mistakes I made. Back then there was almost no literature and certainly no forums. I was glad there was a little bit of internet back then.
The way you prepare your dry food, I completely agree on, specialy since you give it as a supplement, not as main food. No prepared foods can replace what animals find in nature, even the live food we 'cultivate' to feed our animals.
The main reason i joined this form is to learn too. I would like to try breeding the Ceratophrys myself in time. This would propably be the first here in Belgium. All Pac's here are actualy imported from the US and some from Asia. so why not give it a try and do my best.

Ok, let's forget the incident and move on so we can enjoy our hobby once more.

[GrifTheGreat]

No worries Ramp.

I do know very well what it is like to slip up and make an necessary comment. Like Jess said I know all to well how Jess doesn't tolerate rude comments and neither can I. You made a mistake and apologized.

[Sublime]

We might need John in this thread?

[IvoryReptiles]

We might need John in this thread?

Why? No one got hurt, no one is bleeding. Apologies have been given and accepted all around.

The dry foods are formulated to be easily digestible and are made that way to avoid any impaction issues. Even so, I pulverize & moisten it. Like I said earlier, I wouldn't necessarily use it as a primary source of food, but it works great for variety.

[cali]

Skippy-
I also had the idea of using fish-food products for frogs. Even though every organism may have different dietary needs- a frog is still a frog.
Basically anything in those fish-sticks represent something that a frog would eat itself, or it's prey would consume.
It's rare to find a safe, known food source that causes health problems in a random species. (Keep in mind that there's always people that have peanut allergys, shellfish allergys, etc.)

I feed my cichlids NLS color enhancing- and the ingredients (although somewhat different from your formula) appear to be a healthy mixture.
I don't tong-feed full pellets to my frog, but rather crush them into a powder for dusting nightcrawlers. I can only imagine the varity of creatures they eat in the wild and NLS seemd to be a good representation of that diet.

As the others stated, "dry" sticks may cause a compaction or swelling problem. (People now throw birdseed at weddings instead of the customary/historical rice because birds eat the dry rice, it swells inside their gullet and they die.)

[Sublime]

Why? No one got hurt, no one is bleeding. Apologies have been given and accepted all around.

The dry foods are formulated to be easily digestible and are made that way to avoid any impaction issues. Even so, I pulverize & moisten it. Like I said earlier, I wouldn't necessarily use it as a primary source of food, but it works great for variety.

Ok good. I just know from firsthand how things escalate quickly...

[Eel Noob]

I feed my frog Massivore Delite pellets to my frogs once in a while. No problems yet.

[ramp]

So back to the original question, should one feed dry pellets to a Pac Man.

- Better not as it may cause health problems?
- Yes, but crushed and moistened so it will not absorb any extra liquids from the intestents?
- Should one feed Fish pellets, dry or crushed and moistened, even when the ingredients look the same as amphibian food?
- What about color aditives to dry fish food?
- How many 'natural' color foods do actualy contain natural coloration aditives and not syntetic? Personaly I've seen fishfood color the aquarium water redish when it starts to soak up water.
- Could the color aditives cause problems. The dry pelleted foods I've seen and used in the past all had a brownish color, propably withouth any color aditives. Could there be a reason for that?
- In the past and present people also use flake food for raising tadpoles. So would there be any harm in using the pellet food on adult frogs? Don't know if it's used in raising the ceratophrys tads.