# feeding froglets pinheads?



## *GREASER* (Apr 11, 2004)

how soon till froglets can take pinheads. The store down the street from me has a constant cheap supply of them.


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## Ryan (Feb 18, 2004)

If you try to bread them yourself, yes, but they may be too large where you buy them. Three day olds, are about the size of melagnasor,so they would work, look at some sites about breeding them, not as hard as you would think.


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## khoff (Feb 18, 2004)

Keep in mind pet store do not use the term pinhead correctly. Most petstores just call their small crickets pinheads. True pinheads are less than a week old and it is very unlikely your petsore has a constant supply of these. By the way, fruit flies are easier and cheaper; just get cultures established and you will be fine.


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## Guest (May 7, 2004)

I agree with Kevin. Fruitflies are, IMHO, much easier to work with. They do not harbor the problems that crix have such as the strong, foul odor or noise. 

-Bill J.


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## *GREASER* (Apr 11, 2004)

I was wondering just to keep them in mind for a back up.


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## Guest (May 7, 2004)

Is it really bad for them to eat the crickets I have 3 Darts and they are still small and I feed them crickets and they ate them I hate using the fruit flies because they always manage to get out and all over my room


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## jbeetle (Feb 8, 2004)

There is no problem with feeding crickets as long as you gut load them and dust them like you would ffs. The only problem is that most local pet stores don't carry small enough crickets, but thats it. I use them from time to time to add variety, but since I have a large collection and don't feel like breeding stinky crickets (and yes, its way worse then and ff odor  ) right now I stick to mainly ffs. But if you have access to small crickets or breed them, then there should be no problems feeding them as your staple food item.


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## Guest (May 7, 2004)

I dont find them that bad I have 3 tree frogs and they are bigger so I have to buy them the crickts the one i got are "medium" but some of them are big and i feed them to the darts and they ate all of them but one which was too big


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## jbeetle (Feb 8, 2004)

I have heard of some problems resulting from too large food items, mainly prolapses or something... I am not too sure, as I haven't had that problem. yet (knock on wood lol). What darts are you feeding and how old/big are they? I use to keep a lot of crickets when I had chameleons, and boy did they stink! They would also from time to time get loose in the apartment and sing all the time, which doesn't really bother me but can bother your roommates  . The ffs mainly hang out in my room, where all the frogs are so they don't bother the roommates. What kind of treefrogs do you keep?


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## Guest (May 7, 2004)

I have green tree frogs :? lol I am not sure because I had a red eyed tree frogs and the first one died then I got another and it died as well so when I went back to the pet store I told the guy I wanted something that wouldn't die so he gave me these tree frogs and they are full grown but I am not sure how old the darts are i got them a week ago for my birthday and they dont looks as small as som ehtat I saw at pet stores around me the are not full grown but not babies either


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## jbeetle (Feb 8, 2004)

Green treefrogs are nice frogs, but not as flashy as red eyed treefrogs. I have heard that red eyed treefrogs can be more touchy then Greens, so it was probably a good idea to get them and gain some experience with them. After that you can try again at some red eyed treefrogs. You also may want to get them straight from a breeder, but thats up to you.

How big are the darts from snout to vent (nose to butt)? As that matter more then their age when figuring what a good sized food item should be. Also, what species are they (tincs, aurauts, terribilis, etc)?


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## Guest (May 7, 2004)

I guess an inch maybe a little less...I think they are aurauts but I am not sure I have 2 green and black and one blue and black but the blue and black looks exactlly like the green and black ones just blue...its not the blue and black one with all the little black spots. I would like to get tree frogs from the breeder not a pet store but I dont know of any.


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## jbeetle (Feb 8, 2004)

It sounds like you have auratus. They will eat crickets, as when I first started I had tiny auratus and my flys crashed so I got the smallest crickets I could find locally (not that small), but they still went after then and ate them. If you ever get more frogs, I would consider working with ff's or breeding crickets so you can save yourself more money... which means more frogs  .

I know a couple people on this board work with treefrogs, and I am sure if you look around you will find some for sale. I know the classifieds on kingsnake usually has CB ones for sale, but these sometimes are sold to a bigger company to sell and not bred by the actual seller (which isn't always bad, but I prefer to get from the actual breeder if possible). It also depends what kind of treefrogs you want. I have a friend that works with a couple, so I could send you his contact info if you wanted?


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## Guest (May 8, 2004)

HeHe :lol: Once I gave all of my big frogs, auratus, galacs, leucs and the tincs a few 1/4 crickets, this batch was extra tiny, and every frog looked at them go by and looked at me like "are you nuts?! get that crap out of here!" Not one of them would even consider them so I ended up taking the crickets back out :shock: I probably could have left them there but my luck they would set up housekeeping and I would have crickets coming out of my........tanks  They could have easily eaten them, but nope, all my frogs are spoiled  

I have been keeping crickets for over 10 years and did the pinheads and everything when some of my firebellies had babies and I absolutely prefer ffs, plus I have saved tons of money raising the ffs and I have never gotten any smell from the ffs, knock on wood. Plus there is the fact that the darts just need and eat way more and more often than the firebellies do.

Rhonda


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## Guest (May 8, 2004)

Yeah def send me his contact info that would be great!!!


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## Guest (May 10, 2004)

*Try this trick*

I use a pretzel container like the ones they sell at COSTCO, BJ's or SAMS. I put three inches of ground coco-fiber (don't know name but it comes in brick form) at the bottom. I wet it till its moist. I add 6-7 female crickets and 1 male. I add a snapple juice container with Wheateena. Leave the adults in for 2-3 days and then you can either kill them or feed them off to something else. I put panty hose over the top for ventilation, but its not necessary because the container is too steep for the crickets to escape. Put it on top of a TV or VCR that gets warm and in two weeks the baby crickets will hatch. Now to get the baby crickets into the tank, just slowly remove the snapple cover with the wheatena and put into the frog tank. The crickets will either crawl out of the cap and get eaten or the frogs will climb up to the end and eat. When all the crickets are gone put the cap back into the cricket container. I do this everyday in the morning and put the snapple cover back in the evening. I add adult crickets when I see the pinheads diminishing. Always keep the substrate moist. OH and by the way...it never smells.


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## mindcrash (Mar 3, 2004)

How can you tell the male crickets from the female?


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## khoff (Feb 18, 2004)

Females have a long tube thing (don't know its name) coming out the rear. They lay eggs through this. Males do not.


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## melissa68 (Feb 16, 2004)

*Ovipositor*

Ovipositor is what it is called.

here is a link for breeding crickets. 

http://chamownersweb.tripod.com/Other_Pages/breeding_and_raising_the_house_c.htm

Melis


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## Guest (May 10, 2004)

That's a good way to do it. Only keeping a couple of adult crickets at a time will keep the noise and stink down. I get adult crickets by the thousand for my bearded dragons and yup, they stink bad! They have they're own private spot in the basement


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## Ryan (Feb 18, 2004)

I just keep them in my utility room, and never have a problem, i love it because if the fruitflies take a lil while to get going i will beable to feed crickets, or termites. After one bad experience I always have a backup foodsource, if not several.


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