Baby Pacman Questions

[HeatherK]

Hi there!

Congrats on your new baby! He/she is such a cutie!

First of all, I want to tell you that you're doing great. I'm sure we've all felt nervous when we first brought ours home. I know I did! I watched him like a hawk for the first month, & only laid off a LITTLE since then.

You were very smart by cutting the tank in half with the log, making your frog make you feel more secure in a smaller space. My other suggestion to that would be covering up all sides of the enclosure except one, that way he feels even more secure. When I say "covering up", I mean placing a sheet of construction paper or something similar on the outside of the glass so that he cannot see out of it. This will help him not stress out as much about the activity in the room.
People have their personal preferences about a separate enclosure. Some feed on paper towels, & others prefer to leave them in their enclosure to reduce stress of handling. Personally, I feel like moving to a separate enclosure is mainly for people who feed crickets, because the frog will chase the cricket down & may get a mouthful of substrate instead. With the worms, he will probably get a little bit of substrate, but nothing like what he would if he was actually hunting. A little Eco Earth here & there isn't going to harm them, but like with ANY substrate, just keep an eye out for impaction, (making sure your frog poops & doesn't have any hard lumps on its side).

I was going to suggest checking your temperatures, but I see that you have got that down! Even with mine being 5 months old, if my temperature on the warm side isn't 80F, he won't touch his food. The moment it heats up, he's devouring everything. As for the humidity, I try to pay less attention to the actual reading & more attention to how the substrate feels. With the heat mat, it dries out the top layer of substrate terribly, & I find myself having a feel of the rest of the deeper substrate to make sure that it still "packs". (You don't want it dripping wet, but you want it to pack up like you were making a snowball.) When you're misting, are you misting the hygrometer? I know it's hard not to, but just try to avoid that if you haven't already, as you'll get a much more accurate reading!

As for him sitting in the same spot, welcome to owning a pet rock! Sometimes, you'll even have pet dirt with eyes! It's completely normal for them to stay in one spot for days. (I even have to move mine sometimes to make sure he has pooped.)

You seem to be doing great with his care! Perhaps he is one of those frogs who needs a little more time to settle in, or he's just not hungry. Trust me, if your temps are correct, & he's not stressed in his enclosure, you'll know when he's hungry! I would keep offering him food once in the late evening, & if he doesn't take it, simply wait until the next. I would suggest sticking with the nightcrawlers, since you won't have to move him out of his enclosure when you're not even sure that he's going to eat them right now. Also, as stated before, they are very good with being digested.

I truly hope you don't get too stressed out by this, as a lot of us have been through it when getting our frogs! Just give it some time & I'm sure he'll come around. Keep offering the food, wait until he tells you "no", then let that be that for the evening. Perhaps more experienced people will come along telling you how long to wait, but as long as he's not falling limp in your hand or losing weight, I wouldn't be too concerned. If worse comes to worse, there are things you can do to force him to get something in his system, but that's the last resort, & we will cross that bridge when it's time.

I'm sure he'll come around for you! Please keep us updated. Good luck!

[Mobdoe]

Thanks for your reply! It definitely alleviated some of my anxiety hahaha. I think I definitely keep getting some on the hygrometer because it's placed in the back and I mist from the front because I'm like there's no way that it's this high half the time.

I'll definitely keep an eye on him and try my best to feed him every night! Thanks again for sharing your story and your advice. Will keep y'all updated!

[HeatherK]

You are very welcome!

How is the little guy doing?

[Mobdoe]

Hey Heather!

Thanks for checking in! He's doing SO much better! It definitely took a few trips to the pet store to get help feeding him though! I was getting nervous because he's not as big as he should be. The pet store employee also pointed out that it looks like he may have an over-bite? And his right arm is a little lazy. Sometimes when he hops, he'll fall to his side D: So I've been dusting all his meals with Calcium & D3, hoping his bones will grow out stronger and changing his water more often (even though I've never seen him in there) He doesn't like to eat every day, but he'll eat till he's full every other day (2 medium crickets). I'm trying to get him to eat night crawlers but have had no luck. When it finally got in his mouth, he literally spit it out right after LOL! Finding poop in his substrate is also a mission because it just blends right in there, but so far he's pooping every few days!

Here are some pictures!



He looks slim right after he poops and when he eats, he rounds out really well! Just wish the weight would stay on D: