Howdy! And... trouble with new Pacman baby?

[jasonm96]

Hi, there's a few problems I can see which could be causing your frog not to eat.
-Your heat mat is covering too much of the wall
-it's not on a thermostat, it's probably too hot for your frog
-thermometer probe should be directly on the glass where the heat mat is attached - not under the substrate, which will give an incorrect reading.

Another thing, a naturalistic set up is not appropriate for a Horned frog, as they produce far too much waste for this system to work. You also don't need a drainage layer, the frog will appreciate being able to burrow down to moist soil. Just use fake plants, as you'd probably need florescent lighting for real ones to survive. If you do have luck though, leave them in their pots so you can remove them easily as you clean the tank.

What I'd suggest you do is basically start again. Use heat mat (on a thermostat) covering half the wall of one side of the tank. Take the lights off and just use the night lamp, you may also want to provide a lower drop at night time, 75F should be fine. You may not need any heating at all at night but if it drops below 70F in your house, get a thermostat with a night time setting so you can have the heat mat on at night

Jason

[monster]

Move your frog to a quieter room and cover 3 sides of his enclosure so he cant see out. That looks like your living room in the background and a computer beside so im thinking it can be a busy place at times in your house. The noises and traffic and visibility of people and other pets if you have them will seriously stress them out. And stress lowers their immune system making them vulnerable to other illnesses. You should always keep these guys in a low traffic room. Also even though you say you don't think hes impacted when was the last time you found a poop?

[TekNinja81]

-Your heat mat is covering too much of the wall
-it's not on a thermostat, it's probably too hot for your frog
... Take the lights off and just use the night lamp, ... but if it drops below 70F in your house, get a thermostat with a night time setting so you can have the heat mat on at night

Jason, the UTH is the smallest size available, sitting at the bottom edge of the glass, and other than moving it an inch left or right (which seems pointless and would destroy & waste the heat mat now) there's nothing I can do to reduce its coverage. I will move the probe and see what it reads above ground, though I've never seen it exceed 82F when checked with temperature guns, and the ExoTerra Rainforest pads are supposed to self-limit to around 80F to begin with. If it turns out to be much higher than that, I'll definitely look into a thermostat. If anything, we've had to supplement the heating rather than limit it, as our building tends to get rather cold this time of the year. We run a half dozen tanks year round with the Rainforest pads in them, all probed and consistently in the 80F range without use of thermostats, and again most of those using at least a basic fluorescent and/or heating bulb to supplement when necessary. Granted, most of those have the UTH under the substrate as they're non-burrowing reptile tanks.

As for the setup -- this seems to be controversial. Some people say the plants help process waste (Pothos plants were actually recommended for Pyxie/Pacman frog tanks, though that's not what I have), maintain humidity and provide cover. They're thriving so far in the tank so I would like to leave them in there unless that changes and/or the frog becomes too large to share the space, though at that point it'll probably be moved to a bigger tank anyway. We have several live-planted tanks now and have had good luck with them, one of those being the Pyxie's 50/50 split tank, which has both semi-aquatic and terrestrial plants thriving in it, even though the dummy tends to trample them from time to time. :P

Move your frog to a quieter room and cover 3 sides of his enclosure so he cant see out. ... Also even though you say you don't think hes impacted when was the last time you found a poop?

That's actually in the works as I just obtained a suitable tank stand for him yesterday. Despite where the tank is right now, it's actually pretty quiet out here most of the time and I wanted to try and keep him in view from my desk -- but we're going to be covering the sides of the tank and moving him to a quieter/darker area regardless. Hard to say regarding poop-finding, I know he had one the day we put him in the tank, and I *think* I found some last week but it's hard to tell from the damp substrate. We've given him some soaking time in treated water a few times the past week, but nothing at those times at least...

[jasonm96]

The thing is, that is heating the entire tank, as soon as he comes above substrate then he's getting heated. Heat mats are only ever meant to cover half of the tank, be on the wall or on the side. Simply get a smaller heat mat, they're not expensive and doesn't have to be ET. It's better to get ones without the adhesive backing so you can reposition them at anytime and just use insulation tape around the edges to stick it on.

Plants do process waste but not as much as a Horned frog produces. People that do living vivariums use small species like Dart frogs or small tree frogs like Red Eyes which don't produce a lot of waste, therefore can be broke down easily. Most people keep Horned frogs in easy to clean set ups to prevent waste building up.

[TekNinja81]

To update on this, I moved the digital probe above-ground and directly against the rear glass, and shut off both the day + night lights overnight as an experiment. The lighting dome/hood are still on the tank, but I may remove them today/tonight to see how much that affects temperature/humidity. I will not be moving the UTH yet for the obvious reason that I don't want to destroy it unless I absolutely have to.

It's actually pretty warm in my apartment right now, and that in mind: The glass the UTH is on currently reads 84.6F, and the ambient temperature according to the analog thermometer by the front, is about 75F. I could probably drop the heat transfer from the UTH a few degrees with a simple decorative object at the back wall, if needed, and may do so anyway just to hide the ugly heat pad. Otherwise, a thermostat will be a consideration if it's actually needed. Also will try unplugging the UTH and seeing how the tank holds with no heat source, or with just the overhead lighting...

I'm actually rather surprised how *little* the ambient temperature has dropped without the lights on. Would definitely have thought they were heating the tank up a bit more than that, though again, it's warmer than it had been the previous several days.

All that said, the little bugger was actually sitting up on top of the substrate when I came home this morning. I *think* I still had a cricket or two left alive in the tank last night, and if so, I can't find them -- so he may have actually eaten something. He wouldn't accept any food when I tried offering, and eventually burrowed back down again, so I'll leave him alone again for a bit.

[TekNinja81]

Jaeger has been doing well since the last post. He still tends to ignore or hide from my attempts to tong-feed him bits of worm, but I know he's been eating (calcium-coated & gutloaded) crickets when I've put them in for him.

I noticed last night he had a bit of a lump on his right side, so we gave him a 20-minute soaking in some honey-treated water, and again in some regular treated tapwater. About another 20 minutes after that, he had a *huge* poop in his water dish. Well, at least we know he's eating now! :P

[monster]

Glad to hear your little guy is doing better. For the tong he will eventually come around, some take longer then others to figure out they mean dinner and not death. L.O.L A little trick is to rub the food under his bottom lip when tong feeding. And again glad hes doing better.

[LauraS]

Jaeger has been doing well since the last post. He still tends to ignore or hide from my attempts to tong-feed him bits of worm, but I know he's been eating (calcium-coated & gutloaded) crickets when I've put them in for him.

I noticed last night he had a bit of a lump on his right side, so we gave him a 20-minute soaking in some honey-treated water, and again in some regular treated tapwater. About another 20 minutes after that, he had a *huge* poop in his water dish. Well, at least we know he's eating now! :P

This gives me hope for my little Petsmart guy. I hope mine eats soon.