Hi all,
My sweet bold silly boy, Sunny, has become very reclusive around me since I returned from an eight day vacation last Friday. He had always been uninhibited being out in the open around me prior to the vacation. I have his lights and environment automated so he should not have experienced any bad temperatures or humidity levels or anything like that. I follow the care sheets to a t. My husband misted him morning and night, changed his water ponds and fed him each night, and picked up poo. He has always been shy around my husband and now he's treating me the same way. I switched from free feeding to bowl feeding a few days ago and that first day I did that he came out and didn't run away so I thought I was making progress, but now he won't come out until I leave. Is this typical behavior after a week long absence? Do you think he'll come back around? I am going to add something else for him to climb on today if I can find something. I'm hoping that'll get him excited and pull him out of his shell again. I miss his fun little personality so much. Any ideas? Some friends of mine who know nothing about frogs say he needs a friend or a mate. I'd prefer not to get another frog but I want to do whatever would make him a happy frog again. He really seems like he's fine otherwise. I think I'm the one suffering, not him. I wonder if he forgot who I am or what.
Please, give me your honest assessment.
Thank you
That's strange, but maybe he'll just get used to you again. My larger frog wouldn't even take food from me after his first trip to the vet. It took about a month, but he got better.
Frogs usually aren't social animals, I doubt he's lonely.
I'd watch his eating habits carefully and wait two or three weeks to see if he gets better. It could very well be a physical problem. What kind of water do you use? Are his crickets gone when you check on them?
Also, when do you leave? During the day? At night? Mine never come out before 6pm no matter what.
Thanks for the reply, elly.
I mist and fill his ponds with Deer Park spring water and use Aquatize in his pond water.
I'm usually gone during the day during normal biz hours.
I start feeding him around 7:15 pm. I'll put one loose in the cage to catch his eye and then another one or two in his bowl. I wait about 15 minutes and come back to see if he's come out and then add another four or five to his bowl. He always eats all his crickets (dusted with calcium six days a week and multivitamin once a week). The thing is that he used to eat them in front of me and now he hides until I leave and then eats. Nevertheless, he eats and poos like a champ and I worked from home yesterday and he was calling. I don't think he has any health problems physically, but he's obviously less comfortable when I'm around than he used to be. I used to talk and sing to him at mealtime and for a little while after and he'd chill on a saucer or climb around or take a soak after he ate, unbothered by my presence. I miss watching him and his cute little personality because he is usually hiding from me now.
Ask your husband if anything happened while you were gone- like handling, or escaping while the cage was open, or any other potentially stressful event.
In any case... grays are generally very friendly frogs. Once he gets over this and puts 2+2 together that you disturbing the enclosure = food, he'll get excited and jump to the front of his tank when you approach.
Thanks for the reply Dace. My husband couldn't find him and got freaked out worried the frog had somehow gotten out and rearranged some things looking for him. That's all I know about. He's never tried to escape and we don't handle him. I hope you are right.
He's gotten some major upgrades to his digs. He's still not as friendly toward me as he always was before I went on vacation. I've been back a couple of weeks now. I gather this is not a common experience. He was such an outgoing frog. I've been a little heart broken but I'm being patient. My friends say he's acting like a teenager now. His health is good. He just doesn't want to hang out with mom anymore. It's hard to take. I keep trying bribing him. Bigger enclosure. More leaves, more hides. More things to climb on. I feed him six small crickets every night. Should I feed him less? Maybe he isn't coming out because he isn't terribly hungry. Any other ideas, please?
Sadly frogs are pretty simple and unlikely to take bribes. It sounds like he got a scare and is ultra cautious. it might be better to feed him every other night.
elly, thank you for replying. Do you think if I were to feed him every other night that i should feed him twice as much as I do now each night? He won't eat in front of me lately. He waits for me to leave. I've been bowl feeding lately. I am not sure how to tell how many he can eat in 15 min as I've seen recommended elsewhere if he won't eat in front of me.
I held off on answering because I don't really know. How young is the frog? With younger ones it's better/okay to feed frequently. I also don't know how to judge how many small crickets a frog of this species should have, I'm used to figuring it out for larger frogs.
Hi elly, I am really not sure how old he is. I found him in my office in early April and he was so tiny I figured he must be very young but I think he was just emaciated. Once I got him fattened up a bit he started calling in May, so I think he must be a couple years old if calling indicates sexual maturity. He is very energetic so I still think he can't be very old. Back when he would eat in front of me he'd easily eat nine or ten small crickets but if I gave him that many every night he'd start chubbing up a bit. I didn't want him getting too chubs because I am worried about him breaking a leg so I usually limit it to six or seven crickets and supplement with an occasional moth or fly and he maintains a healthy looking physique with that. How does one typically transition from the nightly feeding to the every other night for frogs transitioning from adolescence to adulthood? He always eats all his food every night. Is it bad to feed an adult frog every night? I want him to be more sociable at feed time but I also don't want to make him go hungry. If I could feed him the right amount every other night and he'd be hungrier/more sociable at mealtime that would be great but I worry about him suffering from hunger on off nights.
Frogs are coldblooded so it's generally good to give them some time to digest. He might be a little hungry, but not too much.
Grays might just be small enough to require daily feeding. On the other hand, American Green Tree Frogs are about Grey size and I've seen several recs for feeding them every other day to every two days. My suggestion: stick with what seems to be working. Edit: There's recommendations for feeding Greys as much as they'll eat for 15 mins 2-3 times a week. But if you're handfeeding and the frog won't eat that much at once it might be better to feed less and more frequently?Here's a caresheet from this site.
Here's a caresheet, it sounds like you're already doing the stuff on it, but here it is anyway.
My gray is only 4 - 5 grams in weight (less than a quarter) and about an inch and a half long but he is an adult or at least an adolescent that's nearly adult. I read frogs tend to eat less when the weather cools so I might try this: continue as things are for now since that's working and then switch to a less frequent schedule this autumn or winter and probably give nine or ten crickets each feeding (about 50% more than I give him when feeding nightly and an amount I've seen him consume easily in the past). After I see how that goes I'll come back and let you know what happened. I'm going to continue google searching and reading more about cold blooded animals and digestion. Thank you for the leads, elly.
I went ahead and switched to feeding him every other day. He's only had one night with no food so far (night before last) and seems to be doing great.
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