# Middle toe tapping



## allyn (Oct 6, 2008)

my D. auratas always vibrate the middle toes of their hind legs when feeding. does any1 know why the do this?


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## Bob Fraser (Nov 21, 2007)

hi allyn,
good question- have you tried the search feature " toe-tapping ". lots of reading, have fun

warmest regards 
fraser


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## allyn (Oct 6, 2008)

ok thanks for the tip


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## IndianaJosh (Jun 20, 2008)

I have always wondered too. My idea was kind of like a dog wagging its tail. I tried the search but a lot of searches lead to other links, and after the software update none of them work. Its a bummer.


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## Marty (Feb 27, 2004)

I always thought that it was a hunting aid... tap and feel (listen) if anything is moving under the leaf litter. It's in the frog's best interest to know if the next meal is in its range... sort of like the aye aye... tap and feel

Video - Aye-aye using elongated finger and sharp teeth to find and extract grub from tree - Aye-aye - Daubentonia madagascarensis - ARKive


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## sounddrive (Jan 4, 2007)

Ive always thought it was related to a distraction, if food is focused on the toe it might not notice the mouth getting ready to eat it.


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## allyn (Oct 6, 2008)

Marty said:


> I always thought that it was a hunting aid... tap and feel (listen) if anything is moving under the leaf litter. It's in the frog's best interest to know if the next meal is in its range... sort of like the aye aye... tap and feel
> 
> Video - Aye-aye using elongated finger and sharp teeth to find and extract grub from tree - Aye-aye - Daubentonia madagascarensis - ARKive


yea that what i was thinking to, kind of like it feels the bugs through bouncing vibrations off them through the ground. i think that's pretty possible because ive seen mine start tapping their toe and then instantly whip around and grab a fly that was behind them.


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## upstatenypets (Feb 28, 2008)

I do not have any dart frogs, but all my toads do the toe-tapping too. I named my first toad years back "Jitters" because I noticed his tapping. Then I came to realize that they all did it and Jitters became hard to distinguish LOL. Aside from what was already suggested, they could be anticipating their lunch, getting excited I suppose. For the PDF's, it may also have something to do with warning off predators, just as their colors do. This might be one of those things that no one can completely understand.


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## denfrogs (Dec 10, 2007)

from what i have read the toe tapping is to scare up food. 
the bugs hear and feel the tapping and try to run away, then the frogs can see them once they are moving


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## CHuempfner (Apr 27, 2008)

I believe that it can be any and all of the above.

When I got my first frogs back in April, I placed them in their temp viv and watched for the first couple of hours. All 3 leucs were immediately hopping around checkin out the new digs and tapping their hind toes. I waited until that evening to attempt to feed them and when I threw in the fruit flies, the toe tapping started again. I researched it and found many responses to it, and it seems that all reasons can be considered. Food distraction, signaling each other to stay away, hunting mechanism . . .
It's always fun to watch!


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## MonarchzMan (Oct 23, 2006)

Personally, I don't buy the "drumming up food" idea. I don't believe that the toe tapping would provide enough vibration to scare up anything unless it was literally right underneath the toe. It might work to a degree, but I really doubt it. The range that these frogs hop around and feed no doubt excedes the range of vibration made from the toe taps.

You'll also notice that they'll toe tap when they're courting. I think that it happens in times of excitement, much like a dog wagging its tail. If it meant anything, I'd guess that it's a signal to conspecifics that there is something interesting going on.


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## kamazza (Sep 2, 2008)

My azureus, leucs, and autatus all toe tap, only when I feed them though. I'm thinking its all or many of the above things. I always thought it was out of excitement. But who knows!


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## andyoconnor83 (Oct 6, 2008)

there have been studies shown that it is primarily a feeding response, and although they are light and dainty, imagine in their natural environment on a termite mounds, or in thick leaf litter, who knows what those toe tapping noises sound like if you were a tiny arthropod? I think they do it for other reasons that are unknown as well, but I see them doing it MOST when i drop the flies in, in a captive environment, I can only assume that it is a somewhat natural behaviour.


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## MonarchzMan (Oct 23, 2006)

I have no doubt that it's a natural behavior, but again, that said, I doubt that toe tapping creates any sustantial noise to disturb small arthropods. The fact that they forage a bit should provide a testiment to that. In the wild, I've seen these frogs hopping around looking for food. They very rarely sit still. They're going in and out of leaf litter looking for bugs. If toe tapping did do anything to scare these arthropods, then the foraging behavior wouldn't be advantageous. Remember, these are microscropic animals and it can take time to move and be visible.

Frogs, however, are very visually oriented. They can see these tiny arthropods without any difficulty. It would stand to reason that they could easily see toe tapping in conspecifics. And as I said, I think that it's reason to possibly attract conspecifics as it only seems to happen when they're excited.


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## Smashtoad (Apr 27, 2007)

Hi All,

These types of behaviors are common to many predators, and can simply be likened to excitement. Anurans of countless types vibrate their toes while anticipating food, cats will "chatter" and make a serpentine motion with their tails just before the strike, and leopard geckos do this as well.

Although some frogs (Pacman frogs) have been observed "pedal luring", using a twitching toe to lure small prey, this is different. The twitching mentioned here would have little affect on a prey item other than to maybe momentarily distract it's attention.


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## andyoconnor83 (Oct 6, 2008)

just for the record, I wasn't speaking my opinion, but only an alternative point on the feeding reposnse idea. I personally agree that if it's main point was to scare up or lure prey, they would hold still more, since caudal luring only works if the predator moves very slowly or not at all, like snapping turtles. just the fact that i see more flies move when the frogs make their short little rapid hops when feeding shows that their forgaing behaviour is much more based on jumping around, searching, looking for movement, etc. the excitement idea probably explains the behaviour best.


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## allyn (Oct 6, 2008)

i still think its some sort of way of bouncing vibrations through the ground to locate prey because my frogs will have a fruitfly sitting motionless in front of them and they do not notice it because it is so still. but then they start toe tapping and chomp on the fly. kindof like bats using waves to locate food through the air but through the earth instead. the frogs middle toes are so thin and slender that it seems perfect for picking up minute vibrations. like little tuning forks


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## divingne1 (Mar 21, 2008)

Do the thumbs toe tap or just the larger frogs?
Candy


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## MonarchzMan (Oct 23, 2006)

I've see pumilio tap. Don't know about thumbnails, but I'd assume they do. It looks to be an ancestral characteristic in these frogs (as evident that Bufonidae also shows this).

As for flies sitting still and the frogs hitting them. Remember that these frogs have evolved to notice tiny movements in very tiny prey. A movement of a single leg or antennae will be very obvious to these frogs. So even if they don't seem to be moving, they often are, and the frogs pick up on it.


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## waynowon (Jun 2, 2007)

i suspected all of the above and posted the same question with similar responses, except for one. it was suggested that this may be a way of raising blood pressure, in order to strike. sounded silly at first but after thinking about the size of frogs tongues and the spped at which they strike, it seems logical. of course, i am no expert


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## NathalieB (Apr 23, 2007)

I personally think they tap their toes when they are exited, just like they move their throath and flanks when they are stressed or exited.
I see my frogs tap their toes when they are feeding, when they are courting and when they are fighting (have you ever seen tincs fight: they tap their toes like crazy) so I am sceptical about the "attrackting food" hypothesis.
Although some dutch scientist recently published research where they concluded that the tapping was to keep the insects moving because frogs cannot see imobilized objects.


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## DenZ0r (Oct 19, 2007)

Hahaha Nathalie.... Again it's you! I posted the same thing on another thread strated today about toe tapping. I tried to translate the article from the Dn Forum and here it is:

Source: http://noorderlicht.vpro.nl/noorderl...icht/40235670/

Article:

*Ritmic Frogs*
_Translated by: Dennis Molenaar_

*Frogs drum. They do this to ensure that their prey keeps moving, two Dutch ecologists announced. If they don’t, they won’t see their prey. *
Some scientists believe they tap there toes in order to lure their prey. The moving toes of the Giant Toad (Bufo marinus) attracts little toads and frogs like a magnet. They get curious and move towards the Giant toad to disappear in his enormous mouth.

But not only the cannabalistic Giant Toad tapps his toes. A lot of other frogs and toads also do it, even though they do not eat other frogs, but insects. These insects don’t get wild by a twitching toe. Strange, ecologists John Sloggett and Ilja Zeilstra thought. 

Subtile difference between insecteaters and the Giant Toad is, that they don’t simply wave with it , but drum with their toes. Slogget and Zeilstra recorded a movie wehre you can see and hear this. Because this is the reason , they wrote in the magazine “Animal Behaviour”. The toe tapping of the hindlegs result in vibrations, which will make sure insects near the frog keep moving. Frogs and toads are not know because of their very good sight and if the insects don’t move they will simply not see them. Keep on drumming then!

Written by: Remy van den Brand


Hope you can do something with this, altough I also think it's not only for moving insects!!

Just like Nathalie said they do it when eating, fighting courting and in my experience when they are excited when you are putting them in a new viv. They investegate their new environment (sp.) and the tap their toes too!!

Grtz

Dennis Molenaar


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## vivariman (Sep 26, 2007)

I may have something to add. Last week when I fed my leucs, I left the door cracked so I could watch them hunt (when the door closes they scram) I heard this wierd noise that was equivalent to a starting lawnmower or chainsaw that was about as big as an ant. I looked at the leuc's toes, (the one that was out) and saw them doing the toe tapping. When his toes stopped, the noise stopped, and when there were short jitters of tapping, I heard short jitters of the noise. Could it have been that he was on a particularily brittle/dry leaf? I don't know...... (Twighlight theme)......


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## dwdragon (Aug 14, 2008)

Ok first off I don't have frogs yet so anything I type could be completely wrong!

Disclaimer out of the way.....

There is a possibility that everyone could be correct all at once. The frogs could have a natural instinct to tap their toes when excited. However nature may have inserted this instinct to serve the following purposes:

1.) Keep insects moving around them so they can see to feed.

2.) During courtship to show off to potential mates. It has long been stated that in the wild the strongest survive. The stronger the tap the better the genes to survive and get food and those genes are passed to the young? Just a thought.

3.) Fighting. Pretty much goes with number 2. Since frogs "wrestle" likely the one who is able to tap harder has more muscle. Faster tapping could be faster reflexes. It could be a warning to the other frog I'm going to kick your @$$.

I could just be their way of showing excitment but even most animals that have a way of showing excitement the action usually has another function such as a preferential mating selection tool or what have you.


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