Baby FBT wont eat...

[RJ72]

Hi Jenn,

I'm sorry to hear that your FBT toadlets are not eating. Though I am not too familiar with the FBT species, I do know that it can take a little while for newly-morphed toadlets to start eating - even after absorbing their tails. It seems like you have the right feeder insects. Flightless fruit flies and pinhead crickets are the perfect food for baby frogs.

If you haven't yet tried to, try feeding them individually in a separate feeding tank. Drop the fruit flies one at a time right in front of them. Hopefully this will cause them to react instinctively and eat the fly. This worked for me when I had a baby Gray Tree Frog who took a while to start eating.

Let us know how this goes for you.

I hope they start eating soon.

All the best...

RJ

[Kathryn Dorn]

I'm sorry, and best of luck to you and your toads! I agree with RJ about the separate feeding tanks (especially if you can set up a completely furniture-free small tank with a flat plastic/glass floor - the toad has no distractions from his or her food, and you don't have to worry about insects hiding and possibly attacking the toads later or drowning in the water dish).
I had an adult fire-belly who wouldn't eat at several points in his life, but I think those were different situations than your toads' - I adopted him as a rescue toad from a classmate who couldn't get him to eat (he was too small to swallow the full-sized mealworms that she was offering to him, so we just found smaller insects for him), and when he stopped eating for a few weeks no apparent reason a few years later, his vet recommended feeding him cat food until he started eating again on his own. I had to pry his mouth open with a business card and use a miniature syringe to put the cat food in his mouth, and he hated the process, so I really hope that your toadlets don't have to go through that...

[Alex M]

Are you absolutely certain they aren't feeding at all? Just, it doesn't take many fruit flies or pinhead crickets to fill up a metamorph orientalis belly. Also, what are the temperatures inside their enclosure?

[JennLP1]

Thanks all,

I think I may have been feeding them to early. I tried them again late last night in a separate container with just them and some flies and they finally started to eat them. Hopefully a few more outside feeding and i can get them to eat in their tanks.

[RJ72]

Thanks all,

I think I may have been feeding them to early. I tried them again late last night in a separate container with just them and some flies and they finally started to eat them. Hopefully a few more outside feeding and i can get them to eat in their tanks.

That's great to hear, Jenn!

Don't forget to lightly dust the flies with a quality calcium/vitamin d3 supplement powder 3 times a week.

Continued success...

RJ