Help with raising common frog tadpoles

[Botanist]

Hello, I'm new to this forum and I'm in need of help. Two days ago me and my sister collected a batch of frog spawn from one of our lakes (an estimate would be around 40 tadpoles). I found a suitable clean plastic tub and filled it with around 25 litres of clean rain water. I plan on raising the tadpoles until they are juvenile frogs, then I wan't to release them back into the wild. But I need advice on how to raise them. The tadpoles are looking healthy and are currently consuming the jelly from their eggs. From what I understand once they've eaten the jelly you then feed them defrosted lettuce cut into small pieces. Also I know to change around 1/3 of the water fairly regularly to keep the water clean. Here Is they part I'm a little confused about. Once they start to develop back legs they turn carnivorous? and what should I feed them at this stage? I was thinking maybe blood worms but I'm not sure. Any advice would be appreciated, as this is the first time I've tried to raise tadpoles.

Thank you for reading

[taniaaust1]

Im new at this too, raising my first tabpoles and have some frogs from them now.

While they have back legs they can continue eatting what they are eatting eg frozen lettuce, algae (I also used to give mine some fishflakes but I havent seen that mentioned much online so dont know if that is best..a pet shop told me to do that. I ended up with a quite obese tabpole due to doing that I think..it got so fat that it looked like it had that frog bubble disease). Mine used to also eat their duckweed in the pond (I had to go and buy more duckweed and they ate that too so they are back to having none).

They stop eatting just before they turn to frogs eg get front arms and while they are loosing tails.. They then are feeding upon the reserves they have within their bodies as their tails dissolve.

If you have tabpoles which arent tree frog ones of some kind (common tabpoles dont mean much.. they could be treefrogs or otherwise).. you will need an easy way for them to get out when they are changing to frogs as they could otherwise drown eg a gentle slope for them to get out of is recommended.. needs to start below waterline as non treefrogs dont have the pads on their feet to grip things to climb out.

[Botanist]

Thanks for the reply. So It's fine to feed them just lettuce up until they form into frogs? or would you suggest a more varied diet. Also, the tadpoles are Rana Temporaria.

[MatthewM1]

I've had success raising tads with reptomin pellets crushed into a semi fine for powder. Fish flakes will work as well. I've never used lettuce, it doesn't have very much nutrition wise and probably isn't the best choice. They won't eat insects until they are out of the water and have absorbed their tails completely. You'll be able to feed the froglets flightless fruit flies, pin head crickets, pin head roaches, dwarf isopds, and spring tails.

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[kueluck]

I've raised about 60 tads (grey tree frog & native toads) in the past few years with only a few of them not making it to froglet stage. I would boil romaine lettuce for one minute, let it cool, then sink it to the bottom with a large stone. I would cook it fresh each day and if there was anything left over from the previous day that would be removed. After they started to grow I would use tadpole pellet food a few times a week, but they seemed to love the lettuce over anything else. I also changed out 50% of the water twice a week.

[Donttryfontlose]

I know I am late to answer but I fed my tads algae tablets. You can buy them at any aquarium store or pet store like Petco. They are much less of a hassle then boiling lettuce and all you have to do is break them up and they will soften when they are in the water so the tads can just break off their own pieces. Hope this helps!

[anneke]

HI Botanist, glad I 'found' you as I'm trying to do the same - raising Rana temporaria / common frog. So far my tadpoles are doing fine. I've mainly fed them algae I found in a pond but also lightly boiled dandelion leaf, bread and a bit of boiled egg. The boiled egg thing I read somewhere as advice - they're eating it although they're still supposed to be vegetarians?! They also nibble on the watercress I put in the bowl (mainly on the roots I think). Can't believe how quickly they dirty the water though, wish I knew what eats their poo in the wild - water snails, shrimp, stonefly larvae, other insect/larvae??
As for carnivorous stage - I think aphids might be easy to find and small enough for em to digest? perhaps tiny water snails?

I have some pictures posted on facebook.com/fealebiodiversity of them and will keep posting their development there (album amphibians) - if I manage to keep em alive that is! Do have a look and keep me informed how yours are getting on!

[Strider18]

The tads will eat blood worms when they get bigger And aphids would be good as long as they are from an area were no pesticides etc. are used. Frogs and tadpoles are very sensitive to water quality so you could kill off the whole batch so be careful! Hope this helps!