Raising ACF tadpoles

[Jenste]

Welcome to the forum!

Oh the fun of raising tadpoles - - work but oh so worth it in the end!

Ok, going to go through the bullet points and offer my suggestions.

Firstly, Temperature. I would raise this by 2-3 degrees C. I have always had more success with slightly warmer water. It speeds up the metabolism which in turn makes them grow faster.

Second, feeding. Fish flake is not the best choice as frogs (and therefore tadpoles) have different dietary needs than fish. Pick up some HBH or Zoomed frog bites or Reptomin sticks and use a mortar and pestle to grind these to a very, very fine powder. Feed 2-3 times a day. You can also make what I call "Bloodworm Broth" - take a cube of frozen bloodworm and defrost in 2/3 - 1 cup of water and liquify in a blender. Pour the mix right into the tank. Only use this to supplement up to 1 feeding a day.

Next, Water Changes. These are of the highest importance. Foul water can quickly wipe out tadpoles, especially in a small container. The best way I have found for changing water is to use an air hose to siphon from the bottom of the tank. I can not stress enough to siphon from the bottom - this is where fouling food and waste will collect, not so much in the water column. A turkey baster is also extremely useful. Do 30% water change daily, or 10% after each feeding. Make sure to treat the water with a conditioner to remove chlorine and match the temperature as best as you can.

Oxygen. Use an aerator with an air stone on a low setting. You don't need a high flow. The bubbles themselves do not add oxygen to the water but the surface disturbance does.

Space. You would do much better with a 40 liter (10 gallon tank). The size increase adds a greater volume to dilute waste which is your biggest enemy. Fouling water is the main culprit with tadpole death. Next is poor diet.

I have used 20 and 30 gallon (80-120 liter) plastic tubs when raising multiple batches. I fill about halfway and have never had an issue. I have found that the round bins handle the pressure better than the rectangular bins.

Welcome - Share some pictures!!! For pictures and more info about tadpoles, feel free to check out my page on ACF - Jenste Frogs. On the left hand side you will see a navigation bar. Under "Breeding" you will find some helpful hints.

[Gemma]

Hi Jen,

Thanks for your reply. It's very useful!

I've taken your advice and raised the temperature to 25 degrees

Second, feeding. Fish flake is not the best choice as frogs (and therefore tadpoles) have different dietary needs than fish. Pick up some HBH or Zoomed frog bites or Reptomin sticks and use a mortar and pestle to grind these to a very, very fine powder. Feed 2-3 times a day. You can also make what I call "Bloodworm Broth" - take a cube of frozen bloodworm and defrost in 2/3 - 1 cup of water and liquify in a blender. Pour the mix right into the tank. Only use this to supplement up to 1 feeding a day.

I did think it was a bit odd that every page I found about raising ACF tadpoles said fish flakes were OK, as I knew you couldn't feed them to froglets/adult frogs! I hadn't even thought about grinding reptomin sticks! I have loads of them that my adult frogs won't touch, so I'll start feeding them these tomorrow. I have a freezer full of bloodworms too but my blender's hard to clean at the best of times so I might give them a miss!

The best way I have found for changing water is to use an air hose to siphon from the bottom of the tank. I can not stress enough to siphon from the bottom - this is where fouling food and waste will collect, not so much in the water column. A turkey baster is also extremely useful. Do 30% water change daily, or 10% after each feeding.

Do you have any tips on how to siphon the water from the bottom without sucking up any tadpoles? I just accidentally sucked one up - the poor little thing Thankfully he's OK but I was being as careful as I could not to suck any up and he just got sucked up out of nowhere. After I sucked him up, I decided to remove all of the tadpoles (with a cup) and put them in a large bowl while I changed the water, but it took me an hour to catch them all, by which time their bowl of water had changed temperature and it must have been stressful for them. Do you recommend removing the tadpoles for water changes, or is there a way of siphoning the water without sucking them up?

My air pump is way too powerful, even though it's only a cheap one. It's the only one they had in both fish shops near me, so I'll have to look online for an adjustable one. Will the tadpoles be OK in the mean time without until it comes in the post?

Thanks again for the advice I'll take a look at your website and post some pictures/videos soon.

[Jenste]

Hi Gemma!

With the airline I do a two handed approach when the tads are really little. I use one hand to hold and guide the airline tubing along the bottom of the tank and the other hand to "shoo" away the tads. I have the airline empty out into a bucket and this is where the turkey baster really comes in handy - - any tads who end up going for a ride are easy to suck up from the bucket and put back into the tank. I never removed the tads during water changes. If they are hovering in one spot that I really want to siphon I tap gently a few times in the area and they swim to the opposite side of the tank.

If your air pump is too powerful then put a knot in the airline. You can loosen/tighten it as needed until you have a flow you are comfortable with. You can also disperse the flow a bit by putting on a spliter as if you were going to attach multiple airlines, they can either be used to run multiple tanks at once or simply left open to release some of the air pressure.

[Gemma]

Thanks Jen. I'll try that tomorrow when I change the water again, and I'll buy a turkey baster asap. The buckets that I empty the water into when I'm doing water changes are black so it's hard to see if I've sucked any tadpoles up. I'm going to have to buy a white one I think. If tying a knot in the pump's airline doesn't work I'll cut a little hole in it until I can get a splitter.

There's something wrong with one of my tadpoles I just noticed him lying on his side on the bottom. I thought he was dead, but then he tried swimming up to the top. He keeps sinking back to the bottom every time he tries to swim. He can't stay in the middle of the water at all. What could be wrong? He wasn't like this earlier because I had all of the free-swimming tadpoles in a bowl and none of them were resting on the surface. He looks about the same size as the one I sucked up, so I'm wondering if it's the same tadpole and I've hurt him, or if it's more likely to be something else?

[Jenste]

Could be dietary problems, water changing problems, ammonia levels, genetic deficiency ....who knows. Roughly 60% of tadpoles actually make it to frog stage. The rest die off from any number of problems.

[Gemma]

He died, and there's another one doing the same thing but this one keeps getting up and trying again every time he sinks The rest seem fine though. I think it might be because I stressed them out by chasing them around the tank with a cup earlier when I changed their water. It took me an hour to catch all the tadpoles so by the time I was ready to put them back in their tank, the water in the bowl they were in was cold (my house is freezing), and their tank water was 25 degrees, so that must have stressed them too. I won't be doing that again. I'll test the water in the morning (it's 3am here) as well to make sure that's OK.

I managed to reduce the flow of the air pump, by the way. I cut loads of tiny holes in the airline.

I also counted the tadpoles earlier since I was removing them one by one to change the water. I had exactly 80, but 79 now since one died. I'm definitely going to need to buy that bigger plastic tub!

[Gemma]

I still can't do these water changes without sucking tadpoles up, and my gravel vacuum has grids and bits of plastic on the inside that could easily kill a tadpole. I was being as careful as I could possibly be, had a friend on tadpole watch and still sucked one up within the first 30 seconds. I had to give up and try to scoop some of the stuff off the bottom out with a cup instead. It might be easier when I get a larger tub (hopefully this weekend) but right now I really don't think it's possible to use a gravel vacuum in there. I don't know I'm going to keep the tank clean.