Poe and food.

[Jace]

Poe has had his front legs for about a week now. I lowered his water level, put in a ramp for him to climb out onto when he was ready and made sure he has had his usual fish flakes and algae wafers available. However, he hasn't touched very much food at all since the front legs emerged. His body is looking more and more like a frog, but he's looking skinny to me. I tried a cricket the other day, but he ignored it. However, his mouth is more advanced now, but he still has a long tadpole tail. Should I keep throwing crickets in there until he finally accepts them or stick with his tadpole food?

[John]

He will not eat until the tail is fully resorbed. So hang in there.

[Jace]

Oh. Well that would explain it then. Guess I will suction out the food that I put in there this morning and just leave him alone, then. Kind of miss his little tadpole lips, though. Those were pretty cute....sigh. They grow up so fast....

[Ebony]

Aaaah Jace... You are such a great mum to Poe.

[Paul Rust]

Patience Jo!

[Iratus ranunculus]

Feeding him fish flakes were you? That explains the scoliosis. Fish flakes have a high surface area to volume ratio and vitamins in the B complex are water soluble. It leaches into the water in seconds and he cannot absorb it in sufficient quantity. In some cases this can lead to a deficiency, which will lead to scoliosis and other problems. Algae wafers do not provide a lot of it either.

In addition to eating algae, wild tadpoles also feed on detritus and little copepods and other micro-organisms they get with said algae and detritus. That provides the B complex vitamins they need. For your new tadpoles I would recommend alfalfa pellets (during the harvesting process insect bits get left in), or sinking pellets such as trout chow. An alternative is to seed the tank with detritus from a pond bottom.