Quote Originally Posted by Nick02 View Post
Hello, noob here with 10 or so Couch's Spadefoot Toads.
I found these little guys as tadpoles in an irrigation canal one day, there were THOUSANDS of them, I didn’t really need to catch the little guys, I just stuck a water bottle inside the ditch and about 10 plopped in. I returned three days later, and the ditch was dried up. The rest of the tadpoles coagulated into a big black bio mass dried up and died, it was one sad site to see.

I took them home an put them in a 10 gal tank with a large rock in the center, I fed them frog/tadpole bites which they ate furiously and made lots of poo! in about three weeks all the tadpoles turned into little toads and climbed onto the rock.

I couldn't find anything for them to eat! so I went down to the petstore and found fruit-flies, now I breed them in order to save money, the still toads love the flies!
Now their about 3/4 of an inch long and they enjoy regular to small sized meal worms, which makes feeding time much easier. I've had them for about five months and haven’t lost a single one!

Anyways I need help with the terrarium, it's currently a 10 gallon tank with gravel as substrate. a "stream" flows through the middle fed by a pump. I have a dirt "section" of local soil for them, but they don’t burrow into it even though it's loose and sandy, instead they burrow in the gravel on the side of it! They love to spend time in the water and then they mostly sit on top of the gravel or many rocks some burrow and "hibernate" between rocks and some never burrow. When they go into into the "hibernation" thing their eyes close and a film develops over them, if I start feeding they usually wake up and go to town.

I’m thinking of converting the terrarium to full dirt/substrate as I think a humid "water based" terrarium is not for these guys. I just don't know what to use for the substrate? I would like for them to burrow and be happy. Their kept inside at room temperature. I’ll have some pictures up later today or tomorrow.
Its good that you saved these little guys. I have about 200 eastern spade foot toads ready to hatch. For my set up with a spadefoot I usually get a couple bricks of compacted dirt from the pet store and let the brick sit in the water for about 30 mins then break it apart in the aquarium with a small water bowl at one end and plenty of places to hide. Even though the spadefoot tends to burrow and isn't seen for weeks on end. I spray my tank every night with water to keep it moist for the toad.