RETF help

[Cocinecro]

I have 3 red eyes. I had 4 but one of my males died a little over a month ago. My second male is looking and acting strange, which is in itself strange since my 2 females are doing awesome. When the last male died, he started acting lethargic, sleeping too much, not eating, and sleeping close to the ground. Now the second male is doing the same thing. He seems to do nothing but sleep now, I haven't seen him active in a wile now. Even when he's awake, his eyes are closed. He'll open them to go to his water bowl, then close his eyes while he's in there, then open them to climb out and find a leaf to go back to sleep on. I haven't seen him eat in a while now.

I decided to try and give him a pedialyte soak daily now, and I'm on day 2. I soak him in a 10/1 ratio pedialyte to water for about 20 minutes a day. I seems to help at first, but then he's back to sleeping. He's also currently in a separate critter keeper with just paper towels, a piece of pothos, water dish, and a lot of crickets so I can monitor him.

I know you're going to want details on their enclosure in order to help:
I keep them in a 30gal Hexagonal aquarium, with a screen lid, fluorescent light and a infrared heat bulb. Daytime temps usually around 79-82F, nighttime temps of 72-75F. Humidity around 60-80%. I monitor their temps and humidity with an electronic thermometer/hydrometer. I use a automatic mister with distilled water for misting, and I use spring water in their water dish. I change out the water daily (sometimes every other day if I forget, but never go over 2 days), and always wash out their bowl before refilling. Tank has a piece of grapevine wood, artificial vine, and live pothos for climbing. Substrate is sphagnum moss over cocofiber with a little potting soil for the pothos, substrate barrier, then hydroton. I added hydroton and a substrate barrier after the last male died to eliminate the possibility of stagnant water/mold/mildew problems and help with humidity.

The strange thing is the females. They are doing awesome. I'm serious. They're fat, happy, active, and great eaters. They always wake up for a few hours every night to feed, take a dip and explore. No problems whatsoever. I don't know what I'm doing wrong that is making the males die. All of my frogs are CB's and I purchased them as babies in October.

I've enclosed some pics to help with a diagnosis..

The specimen in question, awake.

The specimen in question, asleep (what he's doing most often)

One of my females, fat happy, healthy, and active.

My terrarium.

I don't get it. The females are doing so well and my male specimens are not. Are the females a little more hardy because of their size? I don't think it's the enclosure that's the problem since the females are healthy. I'm at a loss, any info or advice would be greatly appreciated.

[flybyferns]

Hi,
I am affraid I only have a few minutes this AM. I will try to get things started for you.

Please read ---post #16 --cut and paste all the questions back into your thread here;
answer all the questions as best as possibe:
http://www.frogforum.net/tree-frogs/...enclosure.html

The move to the hospital tank was the right thing to do!
The pedi soak ratio ---- for clarification is ---- 1:10 1 part pedi 10 parts distilled water

Other FF members will help during the day today! But the questions are important !
DON"T handle them !!!!!! only when absolutely necessary! too stressful-makes things worse!

Also see this !!!!!!(great news!)
http://www.frogforum.net/general-dis...-prepared.html

Lynn

[Cocinecro]

1-size of enclosure
30 gal hexagonal, not sure the exact dimensions, i can break out the tape measure later if necessary. Approximately 24" high, and 16" across.
2-# on inhabitants - specifically ( if there is another frog ---size differences ?)
3 inhabitants. 2 female, one male.
3-humidity
usually 60-80%.
4-temp
78-82F Daytime, 73-75 night time.
5-water - type - for both misting and soaking dish
Distilled for misting, bottled spring water for soaking.
6-materials used for substrate
Sphagnum moss, potting soil (only in the corner with the live plant, and is completely covered by the moss) coco-fiber, and hydroton with substrate barrier.
7-enclosure set up i.e. plants( live or artificial) wood, bark etc -how were things prepared prior to being put into the viv
Oakvine wood, exoterra artificial vine, live pothos vine (no pesticides, been in enclosure since October of last year).
8-main food source
Crickets, small-medium sized, always dusted with Reptical.
9-vitamins and calcium ? ( how often )
Every time. I don't use a cricket bowl, so the remaining crickets are eaten in the next few days.
10-lighting
Fluorescent lighting, 12hrs a day, with an adjustable infrared bulb for heat, turned down for night time temps.
11-what is, specifically, being used to maintain the temperature of the enclosure
Infrared bulb on an adjustable "clamp" style dome light, left on the screen lid of enclosure.
12-when is the last time he ate
Definitely last week.
13-have you found poop lately
Not since he's been moved to the hospital tank.
14-a pic would be great ( including the frog ) any little cell phone pic is fine
see original post.
15- how old is the frog
bought as a froglet in October so, roughly almost a year.
16-how long have you owned him
Since October
17- is the frog wild caught or captive bred
Captive bred
18- frog food- how often and if its diverse what other feeders are used as treats
tried mealworms before, they seemed to ignore them. Might try again. I raise Dubia roaches as well for my tarantulas, I might offer those as well in nymph form.
19- about how often the frog is handled
Never, unless necessary (moving to a holding tank while I spot clean the enclosure's glass, tank maintenance).
20-is the enclosure is kept in a high or low traffic area
I'd say medium. It's kept in the dining room adjacent to the living room. Only 3 people in my household, not too much traffic.

I used spring water in the pedi soak, will switch to distilled.

The pic I took of me handling him was on his way back to hospital tank from his soak. I handle my frogs as little as possible.

Thanks so much for the info on the medications. I'll probably be placing an order for metronidiziole as it seems to be exactly what he's needing. He does not have any lesions and I do not think that it is worms as the other frogs in the tank have no problems. It may be a bacterial problem. I did not have the hydroton in the aquarium until recently, and was having trouble with water collecting at the bottom of the tank.

Thanks again for the help!

[Cocinecro]

Day 3 of soaks and being in the frog hospital. Today he stopped sleeping horizontally on the leaves and moved into a corner of the hospital tank. His coloration is looking much better now. Switched from using spring water to distilled water in his pedialyte soak. Still no droppings, and I'm not moving him back to his enclosure until I see him eat. Keeping my fingers crossed.



Here's an updated pic.

[flybyferns]

Hi,
The frog is looking better in post #$4. Great!
Make that call , to get more help.
Keep and eye out for poop !

note: Sphagnum moss ! it is known to cause impaction, so you want to more information on that moving forward.
Most people used the tropical soil on the entire bottom.
Lynn

[Cocinecro]

Day 4 of pedialyte soaks, have lots of small-medium sized crickets and a bowl of small meal worms in his cage. His color has improved, he's active at night, but still no eating. No fecal matter has been discovered, and I just caught him sleeping at the bottom of the hospital tank.
He seemed to be getting better, only to relapse into the same behavior. Not sure what is wrong. Females in the terrarium are doing great. Good appetites and active.

I don't know what is going wrong. I try to do everything that I can to keep them happy, yet the males keep dying. I hate that I can't figure out what I am doing wrong that they are dying.
I can only think of two possibilities: 1. I had water collecting at the bottom of the tank before putting in the clay substrate, may have caused stagnant water to cause bacteria build up. This is doubtful though, it never got too bad, and I cleaned their terrarium regularly and tank never got a bad smell. Also, the female specimens I have are doing great.
2. We had a cold front come in the past two weeks where I live, so their cage temperature dropped 5 degrees night and day as we were not running the heat in our house. Temps fell to 77 during the day and 69 at night for approximately 5 days. Maybe the smaller male specimens are more sensitive to temperature drops. I really don't see a 5 degree Fahrenheit temperature difference causing the death or illness though.
Otherwise, I'm doing a big terrarium build in the next couple of weeks. Complete with a very large Exoterra tank, driftwood, great stuff background, live plants, the works. I was planning on ordering more Red Eyes to go into the new terrarium, but if I can't figure out what is causing the males to die, I might have to put my White tree frogs in the new terrarium instead of more Red Eyes if I can't figure out what is going wrong.
I really hate to do that though. I have always wanted to keep red eyed tree frogs as pets. Now that I have them, I hate that I'm doing something wrong that keeps killing them. I have done everything to the exact specifications on every care sheet I have read on these frogs, yet the males keep dying, while the females flourish.
Any help would still be greatly appreciated.

[flybyferns]

Good Morning,
I mentioned this on Thursday. If you email him he will get back to you!
http://www.frogforum.net/general-dis...-prepared.html
Lynn

[wkcheng2]

I have also encountered this problem before. 1) The frog slept on the ground. 2) Gradually lost in weight. 3) no appetite. 4) Cannot climb on the glass tank(at later stage).

Things to do to save the frog:
1) Use a plastic tank to separate the frog.

2) Owing to the frog refuse to eat for a longtime. You should add some Multi-vitamin (For caged birds) and electrolyte liquid into the water to maintain his life.


3) The depth of water should be very shallow (1-1.5cm), because at later stage if he cannot climb on vertical surface, he may down into the water.


4) Assisted feed for several days. Using a plastic spoon carefully open his mouth and put a small size cricket dusted with cal + vit powder into his mouth.



5) After several days if his condition is better, keep using Multi-vitamin and electrolyte liquid, but stop assisted feed. Put some small crickets in a small container and monitor his appetite.

6) If he starts eating crickets for several days, you may put it back to the large tank.

P.S. 77 during the day and 69 at night is ok. My 20 Red-Eyed Leaf Frog are keeping 83 in summer and 62 in winter for more than 5 year. I have breed it for 3th generations, everything is fine. But make sure changed water daily and don’t use distill water!

[wkcheng2]

RETF has slippery skin. It easily escapes during the assisted feed. In order to prevent this happen, you can use some toilet papers to roll the body of the RETF (not the head), then you can easily and gently to hold the RETF and open his mouth. After finished, remove the paper and use some water to spay it to clean the debris.

[Cocinecro]

Thanks for the info guys! I took wkcheng's advice and filled the floor of the hospital tank with a pedialyte soak. He started sleeping on the side of the tank again. This morning it appeared that there was one less cricket (he either ate it or I just couldn't find it). He also keeps his eyes open more during the night while he's moving around the hospital tank, so it's looking like a good sign. Still no sign of droppings, keeping my fingers crossed. I'll start assisted eating tomorrow if I don't find any. Thanks for the tip on force feeding. It's not an easy thing to do with a struggling frog that does not want to be in your hand.

Also I started a build on a new terrarium to house my red eyes in. The hexagonal aquarium I have them in is not optimal for cleaning and maintenance since I have to go in through the top of the enclosure. I'll start a thread in the terrarium section when I get some more time. Hopefully this will help keep the frogs healthier.

[wkcheng2]

Use toilet papers to roll the frog's limbs and body, then you can focus on opening his mouth

[wkcheng2]

Below is my hospital tank / quarantine tank. Inside the tank, there are two small tanks. One for water and one for crickets. I use towel paper as the substrate. Then you can easily monitor how many crickets the frog has eaten.

[Cocinecro]

Your hospital tank looks almost exactly like mine, except I have a small piece of pothos vine in a corner, and I don't have a bowl for my crickets. Putting one in now.

No droppings today, and I found the missing cricket. He's starting to look too thin, so I'm going to start force feeding tonight.

[Cocinecro]

First force feeding failed. Wrapped him in a paper towel to make him easier to handle, pried his mouth open, and tried to feed him a small dusted cricket with no hind legs. He closed his mouth on it for a second, and I thought he was swallowing it, only to have him spit it out the second I put him back in the hospital tank. Didn't want to risk stressing him out even more, so I'm waiting until tomorrow to try again. Going to get the smallest crickets I can find for the next force feeding or try to grind them into a paste and feed with a syringe.

[Cocinecro]

Had a female start to act funny tonight, not bad.. just seemed to have her eyes closed for a couple of minutes at a time while she was exploring her tank. At first I thought she might just be shedding, but since I already have one frog sick, I decided to go through their cage again and see if I could find anything wrong in their cage. I think I found the smoking gun, the piece of grapevine wood I had in the cage was completely soaked through and had mold growing in one of the crevices.

Now I just feel dumb that I didn't catch this earlier. Live and learn I guess, but I learned my lesson about using that wood in a humid terrarium. Threw out that piece, spot cleaned their terrarium, also got rid of the piece in the White's terrarium as well. Their new homes should be complete within the next two days. The only wood in the new terrarium is Cypress driftwood, and a piece of Ghost wood from blackjungle terrarium supply. Anybody else have problems using certain types of wood?

The male specimen seems to have been really stressed from the force feeding attempt. I might just leave him alone until tomorrow night before I try again, hopefully he'll calm down a little.

[DonLisk]

Hi Cocinerco
New vivs will go through a molding stage but should slowly disappear over time. Some wood definitely molds over pretty back compard to others and its probably a good thing you took out the grapevine if it molding pretty bad.
Usually a small amount of mold is not much of an issue for the frogs unless they are spending a lot of time on the mold itself.

Yeah, force feeding is really tough. You can blend up some earth worms and add in small amounts of calcium and try feeding that with a syringe. I have seen some other blended items used also, like the crickets and innards from meal and superworms. Since it is more a liquid form it is easier to swallow and digest for the frog.

You mentioned the one female is closing her eyes occasionally and was wondering if your using a light at night to view them. Most peoples Red Eyes need total darkness at night and I have seen with mine that even the light from the computer screen near the tank will cause them to close their eyes. Sometimes I can use a flashlight to direct only the outer edge of the light on them and have them not close their eyes but any direct light will.

[Cocinecro]

I use a red heating light for their terrarium, but that's the only light I use in their enclosure at night. I have heard people debate on using these with red eyes, but my frogs have never had a problem with them. I did turn on an overhead light to check on the water levels in their mister just before I noticed her, so that may have been the cause. Just checked on her again without turning on a light and she seems fine.

As far as mold goes, do you recommend keeping springtails in enclosures to keep it in check? I've heard a lot of people say they help a lot, and was thinking about picking up some for the new enclosure.

Thanks for the tip on the feeding. I'll grab some mealworms to add to the mix for tomorrow's feeding attempt. I'm thinking ground mealworms, crickets and a small amount of reptical. I feel terrible trying to force feed them, it seems like I'm almost doing more harm than good with the way they react to it, but on the other hand I don't want him to starve either.

Thanks for the help! I'll keep you posted.

[flybyferns]

Hi,
Mine will catnap at night after they grab a cricket.
I have found that even a red light bothers them? In fact, I have wasted lot of $$ on so called "night bulbs".
I have ALL the daytime lights on timers. They like the schedule.
Like Don said - complete darkness - is best.
I heat w/ ceramics-- very carefully
If possible use probe gauges to minitor temp & himidity
Double check the temps- make sure its warm enough and well ventilated.
If you are hand misting - just before- lights out- is a time you want to give the viv a good mist.

Force feeding is terrible ( for you and especially for the frog)
Always use wet paper towel and gloved hands( powerless gloves)
If you do no have gloves - wet hands.
Wash and rinse your hands before and after handling her and beftor going into the main or other enclosures.
I use a small, needleless, thin, 1cc syringe and gently open the mouth w/it.
( so this would have to be a syringe that the needle attaches without the plastic threading on the end)
The total food amount I push into the frogs mouth is about 2/10th of a cc. Push the plunger slowly.
I go to the corner of the mouth closest to me.
NOT the very tip of the mouth- you don't want it to trickle into the frogs lungs.
You might look at a frog anatomy photo /poster

Hold the frog slightly upright after the feeding for a few seconds, and return it to the glass. You should see the frog swallow as usual.
Like Don says , it must be soft BUT not too liquid.

I dust a small cricket w/ V&C then take the head and back legs off of it -- and squish the guts out of a wax worm.
You need to fill the syringe from the opposite end w/ the plunger out.
You don't want to use the skin of larvae- too hard to digest.

I'm not crazy about the spastic spoon idea. Maybe it works okay for a larger frog though?
I guess it is what you get used to.
The edges of the spoon are sharp ?- and then you have to hold the frog and the feeding tools!!!!

Get the metronidazole asap ! So, hopefully your DM friend can accommodate you today?

Hope all goes well !!
Lynn

[DonLisk]

Lynn, you rock. Nice reply.

Cocinecro, just wanted to add in if your doing the mealworms get rid of the heads since they stay pretty hard or even whole.

[Heatheranne]

Here is a picture of how I hold Twiggy when he needs force feeding. The paper towel is soaked in slightly warm dechlorinated water. You can also soak it in the diluted pedialyte solution. He does not try to squirm.

Good luck!