Need Help With Coqui Eggs

[heathafeatha28]

Hello Everyone... Im new to the forum

Just a little background: Not new to herps; kept a 60 gal aquarium full of axolotls and raised 2 batched of 100+ eggs before deciding that it was too much work...My lovely little axies found a home at an exotic animal organization before I left home for University...

The other day in Bio Lab someone brought in some Coqui tree frog eggs to look at, I ended up taking them home. These particular frogs don't need water for their eggs, and skip the tadpole stage to hatch as froglets. I put together a tiny terrarium for them... What else should I do besides keep them moist??

I have never kept frogs before so any pointers would be great... Im most worried about feeding them when they hatch, heard fruit flies might work---though I think Im going to have to catch wild ones, and I dont know...pull their wings off *nervous giggle*
Im also not going to be around for a few days, probably right around hatching. Do they have voracious appetities when they hatch??

Thanks in advance!

[John]

From spending time on Caribbean islands I'm familiar with this group of frogs (you could be referring to any number of Eleutherodactylus species). I've never dealt with hatchlings though, but I would think they start eating very shortly after hatching. Wingless or flightless Drosophila melanogaster are what you need. A couple of our sponsors sell them and supplies (check the sponsors page).

[heathafeatha28]

I can look into it, but most likely it wont be an option to buy flies online... I live in Hawaii, where niether coquis nor fruit flies are liked very much, especially if you talk to the permitting floks down at the ag dept.

Since the coquis in the backyard are doing fine on local bugs I was thinking of catching/collecting my own. Wild, flighted fruit flies like my compost, if they were relieved of their wings they would probably work. Ants are quite prolific...especially if I leave food unattended...They are quite small and might work, obviously not fire ants, just the teeny black guys. Has anyone ever tried feeding their froglets ants??

[bshmerlie]

The problem is they're going to be eating a lot and it might be hard to keep up with them if you're trying to capture food. Don't they have any reptile shops on the islands where you could get pin head crickets? Never tried the ants before simply because it seemed like a lot of work.

[tylototriton]

You could try collecting leaf litter and detritus. I suspect that they will be very tiny upon hatching, probably too small to even eat pinhead crickets. The key would just be to have access to a lot of leaf litter with little nasties in it like springtails.

Alex