# For those who have trouble raising pumilio froglets



## JimO (May 14, 2010)

As much as I hate to publicly admit it, I have lost far more pumilio froglets than I have seen reach adulthood - many more. I read all the threads debating whether to leave them in with their parents or separate them. Whether to put them into a grow-out vivarium or sweater box. How much to feed them and how often?

I have left up to five froglets in with a trio of Cristobals and have some live several months, only to have them disappear one by one and never grow like I thought they should. I never observed any aggression from the parents or among the froglets, but they just didn't seem to thrive. I had this happen with several groups of Cristobals, with Bastis, and most recently with my trio of Salt Creeks. 

I can tell you that I have tried many methods, with little success - until now! I know that others with far, far more experience and success might disagree, but I just want to share what has worked for me. I wanted to accomplish several things:

1) Keep them in a small enough container to monitor them.
2) Disturb them as little as possible.
3) Make food constantly available.
4) Give them plenty of cover.
5) Avoid crowding them.

After talking to some friends, I decided to remove them from the parents' viv as soon as I saw them. I found two newly emerged Salt Creeks about a month ago. I set up a shoe-box sized plastic container. I lined it with a couple of inches of quality New Zealand sphagnum that I saturated without having standing water. I then added 3-4 inches of live oak and magnolia mixed leaf litter that was boiled before use. I tossed in a couple of Pepperomia cuttings from the viv they came from. This nearly packed the box to the lid. I made sure that the leaf litter had plenty of air spaces and hides by using a combination of curled leaves, twigs, and acorn caps.

Finally, I added thousands of springtails and sprinkled a little bit of yeast to feed them. I have peaked in a couple of times over the past month to make sure they had springtails and to add some dusted runt ffs. Today I photographed the results. These are the fattest pumilio froglets I've ever seen! And, the springtail population seems to be keeping up with their feeding. In the future, I plan to keep it to one or two froglets per box.

Here are the photos showing the frogs, the set up, and the springs I found when I turned over a magnolia leaff.

Here are shots of the set up from above and the side














You can see both froglets in this photo








Look at all those springtails








And this is the result - one fat and happy froglet.








I'm not a pumilio expert by any stretch, but wanted to share this in the hopes of helping someone.


----------



## frogparty (Dec 27, 2007)

those are some FAT froglets. 

your growout tubs look great. I use a layer of turface under the moss/leaves for mine


----------



## tongo (Jul 29, 2007)

Thank you for the post!


----------



## Baltimore Bryan (Sep 6, 2006)

I have had success with very similar methods, I just use a 2.5 gallon glass tank instead of a plastic box. Moss, lots of leaves, springtails, and a small plant clipping. I pull froglets once they move down to the floor and begin hunting for springtails, generally 2-6 weeks after they morph out. This approach has worked better than leaving them in for months for me.
Great looking froglets and good luck with the rest!
Bryan


----------



## Dendrobait (May 29, 2005)

Any though to using clay sub rather than sphagnum?

Also, no supps other than what is on the FFs? Perhaps dripping a bit of Repashy Rescuecal on the backs of these guys wouldn't be a bad thing to do(the problem is that Repashy Rescuecal does not contain Vit D3 and even if a similar product did I don't know if it can be observed through the skin-I'd imagine yes tho).


----------



## Dr Christopher McHale (Apr 3, 2014)

This is a great post!

Humility at its finest.

I think some of the best lessons you can learn in breeding and raising animals are learned by killing lots of them.

If you do everything right every time you don't ever learn damage control techniques.


----------



## Judy S (Aug 29, 2010)

unfortunately, sage advice as long as your memory is intact...


----------



## Armson (Sep 8, 2008)

Dendrobait said:


> Any though to using clay sub rather than sphagnum?
> 
> Also, no supps other than what is on the FFs? Perhaps dripping a bit of Repashy Rescuecal on the backs of these guys wouldn't be a bad thing to do(the problem is that Repashy Rescuecal does not contain Vit D3 and even if a similar product did I don't know if it can be observed through the skin-I'd imagine yes tho).



Challenge Accepted.....


----------



## whitethumb (Feb 5, 2011)

what kind of springs are you using in your growouts?


----------



## Armson (Sep 8, 2008)

Armson said:


> Challenge Accepted.....


Here are the setup pics, my phone battery died before I could take more pics. So just try to imagine a light covering of ABG over the clay and then a ton of leaves (live oak and magnolia).


----------



## JimO (May 14, 2010)

I've tried a half dozen species and the one that is the most prolific is the tropical white springs. So, that is the only type I'm culturing at the moment.


whitethumb said:


> what kind of springs are you using in your growouts?


----------



## hypostatic (Apr 25, 2011)

This is what I do for my azureus!

But not for long since they can take FFs.

So they don't get any vitamin/mineral supplementation?


----------



## Armson (Sep 8, 2008)

I don't have any Juv Pumilio at the moment, So I decided to use a Paru.


----------



## JimO (May 14, 2010)

I use runt melano ffs as soon as they can handle them and they get dusted with every feeding.



hypostatic said:


> This is what I do for my azureus!
> 
> But not for long since they can take FFs.
> 
> So they don't get any vitamin/mineral supplementation?


----------



## whitethumb (Feb 5, 2011)

how big do they morph out?



Armson said:


> I don't have any Juv Pumilio at the moment, So I decided to use a Paru.


----------



## Armson (Sep 8, 2008)

whitethumb said:


> how big do they morph out?



I would say that size. This guy is prob fresh out of the water. 


-B


----------



## JimO (May 14, 2010)

They're pretty tiny - probably less than half the size of a tinc froglet.


whitethumb said:


> how big do they morph out?


----------



## whitethumb (Feb 5, 2011)

probably the size of most ranitomeya?



JimO said:


> They're pretty tiny - probably less than half the size of a tinc froglet.


----------



## hamz77 (Mar 17, 2013)

I had a salt creek morph out about 10 minutes ago. When should I pull him?


----------



## PDFanatic (Mar 3, 2007)

I pull my froglets asap and put them in a grow out. As long as its loaded with springtails, isopods and such it will be fine


----------



## JimO (May 14, 2010)

I am now pulling them as soon as I see them. The two froglets I originally posted about are doing great and growing like crazy. I pulled two more this week. I'll post some photos this weekend showing my progress and I might try to get a shot showing a size comparison.



hamz77 said:


> I had a salt creek morph out about 10 minutes ago. When should I pull him?


----------



## Dendrobait (May 29, 2005)

Anyone have an idea how many springtails it takes to rear pumilio froglets out? I have 3 shoebox size cultures going and am thinking of starting up some froglet bins to prepare ahead.


----------



## oddlot (Jun 28, 2010)

For me it depends on the frogs.I pull my cristos shortly after they morph maybe a month ,because the parents seem to bully them a little.My Bribri and escudo,I leave in the parent tank til I'm about to rehome them,because they do well.I have at least 5 froglets in my Bribri tank now.They are from different clutches.All others I keep an eye on how the parents are treating them.If they are fine,I leave them in tank.

Dendrobait:The more springs the better.I'm out of control with my springs.I raise several species and continually add more to my pumilio tanks.I have a lot of cultures going just in case there is an issue,I always have more that can be split or fed.You can never have too many.


----------

