Please help a newb out??

[ByThePrey]

Hey!! So, I'm new to this forum, new to fire belly toads, and new to the whole froggers business in general. I be done fish for many a year, and I used to raise tadpoles from our creek and release them back when they were older.... So I don't have much experience.

I have an 18x18x18 tank, it's 24 hours old... And having some problems. I have well water and because I have a sw marine tank I have a RO/DI water filter, which is what I used for my frogs habitat because our water straight from the faucet would probably kill them..... with that being said, I'm having a large collection of white foam collecting from my little water fall and my female toad is pretty dark. She went a deep Brown in like, 5 minutes... The male is still brightly colored. I haven't heard chirping this last half of the day... Kinda concerned. I be had these buggers for 4 days?? They still eat just fine. I do have healthy feeder guppies in there because I love watching them try to grab a few and totally end up missing lol!!!

So anywho. I didn't want new tank syndrome to wipe them out so I added an appropriate amount of SEED bacteria to get a bb colony started... I just looked at the foam and it's a little more on the bubbly side. I boiled all my rocks and cork bark... idk what's up here. The fish are fine though. (:

Here's my tank and froggers

https://m.imgur.com/iIvafJg

http://imgur.com/a/Fwj1b

http://imgur.com/a/Csrkl


So really quick before I give you a run down on my tank and what's in it, I have noticed that my male isn't chirping as much or grasping her anymore. ((He wouldn't get off the poor girl since I got them no matter how much she flees to land...)) And I wonder if the color change was done on purpose??? She blends right in now with the darker environment... anywho here is my list:

Feeding-- Every other day-- slowly building up the amount of small Dubai roaches they get. I got these guys super narrow looking. I feed them a wax worm the day they aren't getting a bigger meal... I feel bad that they keep missing the guppies.. LOL. I give them a dusting of calcium and vitamins on the roaches.

Tank stuff-
False bottom with 3 inches water, the dirt and stuff are held up by egg crate and pvc pipes
Boiled rocks and cork board
Coconut dirt **** ((working on getting better soil... might not happen for a while.))
Frog moss ((not the shagum whatever because it stuck to them and they were having a hard time with it.))
Live plants
Aquatic plants
Those little clay balls you get from the pet store... bacteria habitat basically.
Besides my gupppies ((they're still all there))... that's about it...

Lemme know what you think is going on please :/

[alane]

Well, you are starting up a tank, so expect all kind of weird stuff to happen to the water. At the beginning of this year, I also started an FBT tank. I got a water test kit and observed the process of cycling...many days of very high ammonia. Then that went away followed by many days of very high nitrite. Then that went away and I am left with nothing but nitrates. It took five to six weeks in all. The water went through some changes for sure. I have many toads. 5 adults and countless juveniles in 15 gallons (7 inches) of water and somehow the water remains stable. External canister filter.

My frogs were in there the whole time during the cycling process. Early on I got some foam but it disappeared within a week. I'm realizing that these frogs are actually capable of living in some pretty filthy water (in the wild).

They change color at will. Don't read much into their color.

They eat well. Can't say i've ever seem a fire belly toad refuse to eat unless it was already catatonically stuffed with crickets.

[ByThePrey]

Well, you are starting up a tank, so expect all kind of weird stuff to happen to the water. At the beginning of this year, I also started an FBT tank. I got a water test kit and observed the process of cycling...many days of very high ammonia. Then that went away followed by many days of very high nitrite. Then that went away and I am left with nothing but nitrates. It took five to six weeks in all. The water went through some changes for sure. I have many toads. 5 adults and countless juveniles in 15 gallons (7 inches) of water and somehow the water remains stable. External canister filter.

My frogs were in there the whole time during the cycling process. Early on I got some foam but it disappeared within a week. I'm realizing that these frogs are actually capable of living in some pretty filthy water (in the wild).

Man that's a ton of toads! Yeah I'm extremely familiar with the nitrogen cycle, I'll have no problem with that. I'm glad you kept yours in, I was wondering if Ammonia burn was a thing for froggers, but apparently they're pretty tough lol. I did the same thing to my frog tank as I have done with my 75 gal community tank, I seeded it with beneficial bacteria right away, took about a week and a half for me to have ammonia rise from .50 ppm to 0.0!! I'm pretty impatient with freshwater... So hopefully the cycle goes by fairly quickly in the frog tank. I guess I should've expected some weird stuff to happen, thank you for your reply!! I really appreciate it!