Hi from Tujunga, California!

[frumiousfrog]

Hello everyone!

After trying to access information from various forum pages on this site over the past few years, I realized I could become a member and participate more actively--so here I am!

I'm a former zookeeper, but my experience with amphibians is limited. Not counting the toads and tadpoles I kept when I was a child, it actually began with my interest in reptiles--mostly turtles and tortoises (I have terrible luck keeping snakes!). About 4 years ago I attended my first reptile show, and I came home with a pygmy leaf chameleon, some baby veiled chameleons, and 5 argus reed frogs (hyperolius argus, I think?). The leaf chameleon died within the month, as did one of the veiled chameleons. The other veiled chameleon survived a bit longer, but to my amazement, the reed frogs did quite well!

I lost all but 2 of the reed frogs a couple years ago (it seems that the water in their terrarium became toxic somehow), but I felt encouraged to try to find more, since they didn't seem to be that demanding. Unfortunately, I've had absolutely no luck in locating more argus reed frogs. However...various visits to pet shops and reptile shows has led me to discover other attractive frogs. I don't have a lot of money, so I've stayed away from the more expensive species (thus far!). I find many of the common (and less expensive) frogs to be just as attractive and rewarding to keep.

Aside from the surviving argus reed frogs, I currently have 2 fire-bellied toads (the brown ones, I'm still learning scientific names), at least one (or possibly two or three--can't find them in their vivarium) red-eyed tree frog, one Great Plains toad, 2 Egyptian toads, and 3 absolutely beautiful peacock tree frogs, which I think are also called big-eyed tree frogs.

I have acquired most of these quite recently, so I have lots of questions about caring for them. I DID have a lovely ornate pacman frog, but it died suddenly. I am hesitant to try pacman frogs again just yet, but I'm always looking for more reed frogs!

I don't have any photos of my frogs yet--I'm always nervous about handling them and even opening their vivaria for more than a few seconds to feed them. Well, except for the toads, of course...

[Tom Highum]

Welcome to the Forum. It is great to have you here, where did you used to be a zookeeper? Argus reed frogs are pretty I am glad a few ended up surviving. Do you have any pictures? Before the pacman died was he exposed to low temperatures because I believe they are sensitive to them. Be free to ask questions and share your knowledge.

[Kurt]

Welcome aboard. I see reed frogs all the time over at Kingsnake.com/classifieds. Snakes are the easiest of the herps to keep, so I can't understand how you had problems. As far as I know, all the pygmy chameleons, Brookesia sp, are imported/wild caught specimens that have a real hard time adjusting to captivity.

For your taxonomic information; Bombina orientalis is the most common of the fire-bellied toads in the US pet trade, so most likely that's what yours are. They can either be on the brown side or bright green.
Your Egyptian toad is most likely Pseudepidalea viridis, the Eurasian green toad. Most, if not all, specimens are wild caught out if Egypt. The species range surrounds the Mediterranean Sea and extends eastward at least to Armenia.
The peacock or big-eyed treefrog, Leptopelis vermiculatus is a native of East Africa. Juvenile are beautiful, being emerald green with black reticulations dorsally and having white patches around toward the undersides of the arms, legs, and upper lip. The fingers and toes are white with black bands. Unfortunately, they don't stay this way. To see an adult go to my photo albums, I have a photo of one there.
The Great Plains toad is Anaxyrus cognatus and the red-eyed leaf frog is Agalychnis callidryas. Oh and the argus reed frog, oddly enough, is Hyperolius argus. Your pac-man most likely was Ceratophrys cranwelli.

[frumiousfrog]

Thank you, Tom, for the welcome. I was a zookeeper at the Los Angeles Zoo for about 15 years, but I worked strictly with warm-blooded animals.

I don't have any pictures of my reed frogs, and actually I haven't seen them or heard them in a couple of weeks. They tend to hide in the plants in their terrarium, and I leave them alone until it's time to clean the tank or replace the plants. I have only one pair--the male is greenish and the female is brownish with lighter spots. I'll be tearing down their terrarium soon to replace the plants, and if the frogs are still there, I'll try my hand at getting some pictures.

The pacman frog wasn't subjected to any low temperatures, since it was summer when he died. If anything, he may have gotten too hot, if that's possible. However, I had him in a small aquarium with shredded coconut fiber as a substrate, and he often ingested small amounts when he ate, because he was a clumsy feeder. I wonder if it would have been better to feed him in a separate tank, without any substrate? I just didn't want to handle him too much, and I had been told the coconut fiber was good because he could dig down into it (which he did).

I need to learn more about them before I try another pacman frog, but even at the reptile shows, the vendors give conflicting information!

[frumiousfrog]

Thank you, Kurt, for the very informative post!

As far as keeping snakes goes, I haven't tried for some years. As a child I tried to keep a wild-caught mountain kingsnake alive, but naturally I didn't know what I was doing, so it did not survive long. I also tried various ribbon or garter snakes, and they would do fine for a while, and then suddenly I'd find them dead. I suspect that I was not keeping them warm enough. They were active and ate regularly, but maybe they were not digesting their meals properly. The last snake I had was a rescue--I was working for a guy who imagined himself to be a movie producer, and he needed a large snake for a scene in one of his films. One of the crew brought him a 6 ft. boa constrictor that had not been fed in about 8 months. The snake belonged to the crew member's roommate, and had bitten his hand when he was feeding it. He solved the problem and punished the snake by withholding food after that, which is why it hadn't been fed in so long. When the snake was no longer needed for the film, my boss gave it to me as a "gift." I was working at the zoo at the time, and my supervisor let me bring home a frozen rat, which I thawed and offered to the snake. She ate it readily, and so over the next weeks I began fattening her up and looking for a good home for her. The story ended happily--one of my coworkers at the zoo adopted her, took her to the vet (she had a respiratory infection, it turned out, and needed medication), and ended up falling in love with her. Once she was back in good health, she turned out to be a very mellow and responsive pet, according to my friend, who described her as "one of the sweetest boas I've ever seen."

Thank you for the taxonomy lesson, as well. I had tried to find out more about the Eqyptian toads, and found them listed as Bufo regularis. As for the peacock tree frogs, I wasn't absolutely sure. I have 3 of them, and each is different. The smallest is beautiful, emerald green with beautiful markings as you described. Another is a uniform green in color--in fact, when I bought them, I didn't even think it was the same species. The largest is somewhat marbled, green with brownish markings. He seemed weak and thin (even by tree frog standards) when I purchased them, and I told the store owner I would pass on him and just take the other two. But the owner gave him to me free of charge, since he was the last one he had, so I brought him home. Since then he has been eating well, and I hope he will be okay.

I do have one question, though--should I worry about overfeeding frogs? I don't really count how many crickets I feed them. The Agalychnis callidryas seems to eat his fill and leave the rest, as do the Hyperolius argus. (The toads seem to be gluttons, so I am a little more conservative in feeding them.) I try to feed enough that they will have a few left over after about 24 hours, and then I wait to feed again after they've gone about a day with no visible crickets left in their vivaria. Sometimes I can't get crickets of the right size for a few days, and they may not eat for 4-5 days or so. I have also occasionally fed flightless fruit flies to the reed frogs, and I may offer some to the Leptopelis vermiculatus to see if they like them.

I'm sure there's a thread somewhere on this site with information about feeding, but I just happened to think of the question in connection with the frog that seemed too thin when I brought it home.

[Kurt]

You're welcome.

A frog that is overly thin may have gastrointestinal parasites and/or organ failure. A vet will need to diagnose the problem to be sure. Leptopelis treefrogs are generally not thin like Agalychnis, they have a tendency to be quite robust. You may be able to identify your big-eyes through this site - http://amphibiaweb.org/lists/Arthroleptidae.shtml You will have to scroll down to the spot where Leptopelis treefrogs are.

I would not worry about your feeding. There are really no exact rules here. You just have to feel it out and see what works best. You should feed small frogs and froglets more often than adult/large frogs. More active species should be fed more often then less active ones. I feed my adult/large frogs once a week and the little guys every two to three days. I am generous at the feedings.

Your mounatian kingsnake, was it zonata or pyromelana?

Two years ago, I was staying in Anaheim and planned on going up Rte 5 to see the LA Zoo, but instead I headed south on 5 and went to San Diego. I am glad I did, the San Diego Zoo was THE best zoo that I had ever been too. Next time I am out there I definitely want to hit the LA Zoo, that and the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach.

[frumiousfrog]

Wow, great pics on that website--thank you! It's amazing how many different frog species there are. I visited the Okavango Delta in Botswana a couple years ago, and when I asked the guide to show me some "reed frogs," he showed me something that was quite different from any reed frog I've ever seen pictured or for sale in this country. There must be many unnamed and undescribed frog species from such a huge continent!

I guess I really need to look more closely at my frogs, but I haven't really handled them yet, since they are recent acquisitions, and I want them to settle in for a bit before I get too familiar. The small one is certainly Leptopelis vermiculatus, but the largest one (the one that was so thin, given to me free by the store owner) COULD be Leptopelis barbouri, just going on the pictures. The third one is a tough one to call--it's much more plain than the other two, but still has some spots on its back. I would not have thought they were all the same species, at first glance--but I would assume they were all wild-caught in the same area, at least.

Quite honestly, since you mentioned it, I don't know of any vet in this area who has expertise in treating frogs. Reptiles, yes, but frogs, no. Luckily, the thin one has been eating well, and looks much better now. In fact, all three are eating, and at least one is vocalizing every night. I have mixed feelings about buying wild caught frogs, but at the same time I'm hoping the store where I bought them will get more of these, because they are so beautiful. I will try hard to get a decent photo of them in the near future, to post on this site.

By the way, the mountain king snake was zonata, I believe, from the Santa Monica Mountains where we lived. I was only about ten years old when I found it in the street--one of our neighbors saw it and rushed to inform my mother (who was very much afraid of snakes anyway!) that I had picked up a VENOMOUS CORAL SNAKE!!! Everyone in the neighborhood came to see the terrifying creature, and my mother was ready to kill it. My dad, however, trusted me when I said that I knew it was a king snake, because I had seen it pictured in a field guide at school. I also knew that coral snakes did not live anywhere near us, so I was allowed to keep it. Sadly, I didn't know how to care for it, and I should have released it--but kids learn by making mistakes, don't they?

[Kurt]

So do adults.

Its possible you have more than one species possible, but my best guess is that all your Leptopelis are the same species. As far as I know Leptopelis barbouri is not imported, I could be wrong though. The two most common species are flavomaculatus and vermiculatus.

Reed frogs are large, diverse group. Its such a shame that they are imported under the heading of "assorted reed frogs"

[StephenLS]

How loud are reed frogs ... in comparison with American Green Tree Frogs for example?

I love the look of them but have read so much about there excessively loud calling that I am dubious about having them in the house!

Ta

Steve

[Kurt]

To tell you the truth, I just don't know.

[frumiousfrog]

Hyperolius argus are not loud at all. Their call is almost like a clicking sound. You can find a sample vocalization at:

Academy Research

When I had several of these frogs, they vocalized every night. When I got down to one pair of frogs, the vocalizations were much less frequent. I miss hearing them--even my roommate smiles when they call, and she's not really a frog person (although I think she has potential...).

[Kurt]

Work on her. Frogs need as many friends as they can get.