# atelopus



## james67 (Jun 28, 2008)

ive been doing some more research on these guys after seeing a group of zeteki about a month ago. while i know that these are unavailable, and i wouldnt like to even inquire about such things, i would like to know if there are still some atelopus coming in. for instance, why are there not Atelopus flavescens in the hobby? as time goes on and now that i see these are pretty darn small animals (could potentially be added to a dart collection w/o much added hassle), they interest me more and more.

any info on recent imports, bans, etc. would be appreciated.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Other than most of the populations are critical in the wild? Or that unless they handled carefully preimport, the ones that do come in have really poor survival rates? And are male heavy.... 

Most countries aren't exporting to the US for several reasons including but not limited to the fact that the market is better in Europe and Japan... 

I still have one of the few surviving A. s. hoogmoedi from the last import. 

Ed


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## james67 (Jun 28, 2008)

wow hoogmoedi are really some of the most beautiful atelopus IMO. yellow? from Peru i imagine? if you don't mind my asking, how long ago was the "last import"? within the last few years, or longer? i have to imagine that you were unable to pair these animals. Ive heard that they are relatively easy to breed and produce large quantities of offspring.

ive just been so intrigued since actually seeing some atelopus. much different than i imagined. and the fact that these particular animals were housed in the most basic of terrarium, with a layer of sphagnum and some fake plants, made me feel as though i could maintain these animals with a far better quality of life. 

thanks for the info. id like to hear more.

james


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Hi James,

I'd have to check my records, but I think it was about 5 years ago. Unfortunately other than the Zoo collected zeteki and varius, Atelopus have been very difficult to breed in captivity. I think ABG still has several surviving males but I haven't heard of any others. 

The imports of hoogmoedi came in with sex ratios between 5 to 1 to 10 to 1 male to female and were all in very poor condition (all very thin and many looked like they were run through a cheese grater). I was able to secure two females and finally was able to stabilize a group of 4.1. I spent a year getting the toads into breeding condition and then while cycling the female for reproduction, she prolapsed the eggs and died. 

With the hoogmoedi that people were able to stabilize virtually none of the females survived (at least here in the US). Of the several clutches I know were obtained, none were fertile and within a couple of years most of the animals were deceased. 

Atelopus in general have a poor history when imported via the pet trade. A. flavescens were imported several times and I am aware of only one successful reproduction of which none of the tadpoles survived to metamorphosis. 

I know that in the last two years there were some further imports into Europe but other than some initial conversations on how to stabilize them, I haven't heard anything since. 


Ed


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## Woodsman (Jan 3, 2008)

The only Atelopus I have seen offered for sale was A. spumarius on Dutch-rana.nl. Ed woulod know better what the rarity and history of this species is and whether these are captive born animals or wild-collected.

Take care, Richard.


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## zBrinks (Jul 16, 2006)

The same frogs were available on dartfrog.co.uk a couple months ago - I believe two group were available at around $350US for 3.1.

Amphibian Pricelist


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## edwardsatc (Feb 17, 2004)

james67 said:


> wow hoogmoedi are really some of the most beautiful atelopus IMO. yellow? from Peru i imagine? if you don't mind my asking, how long ago was the "last import"? within the last few years, or longer? i have to imagine that you were unable to pair these animals. Ive heard that they are relatively easy to breed and produce large quantities of offspring.
> 
> ive just been so intrigued since actually seeing some atelopus. much different than i imagined. and the fact that these particular animals were housed in the most basic of terrarium, with a layer of sphagnum and some fake plants, made me feel as though i could maintain these animals with a far better quality of life.
> 
> ...


The last import was in Spring 2004. I received 8 (2.6) animals from this importation through Glenn at what used to be Seaside Reptiles for $20 ea. (as some may remember, Glenn brought in the large pumilio importations from panama about the same time). As Ed said, these toads came in very poor condition. It's funny that Ed uses the term "cheese grater" because that was my first thought when I received them. I had one female that looked as if her nose had been pushed along a cheese grater, the nosed was rubbed past the nostrils, through the bone, and I could see inside the nasal cavities. Needless to say she didn't make it too long.

I managed to nurse 4 males and one female back to health. Once healthy they were very easy animals to care for. Before I had a chance to attempt breeding, my female suddenly died of unknown reasons. I lost two males this winter to an unfortunate accident in the frog room. I still have two males left.

Great animals and easy to care for after the initial pain of nursing them back to health.

Personally, considering widespread population declines/extinctions of Atelopus populations, and the abysmal survival of imported specimens, I hope we do not see any more import/export of Atelopus species.


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## Eric Walker (Aug 22, 2009)

i agree, leave it to mother nature. she knows best


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## james67 (Jun 28, 2008)

that obviously hasnt been the case with the zeteki at least. all zeteki have been collected and brought to labs, to "save" them from chytrid. although if as Ed said other species are nearly impossible to breed, then i dont see a reason to bring them into captivity. im not looking for some impossible to breed animal on the brink of extinction, id try and find some lehmanni if that were the case. rather, i simply wondered if these were still around, and what people's experiences have been with them. 

are the females getting eggbound? i heard this on a program about atelopus, but i hadnt heard of this occurring with amphibians, until then (i remember this issue from my time with chams however)

james


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## ghettopieninja (Jul 29, 2008)

zeteki have proven to be much easier to care for in captivity than other atelopus, I think a lot of this is due to the fact that it was zoos that brought them into the country and therefor their condition when they arrived here was much better. Also unlike many species they appear to need no 'trigger' to deposit their eggs and are less likely to become fatally eggbound. Also the tadpoles will take a variety of algae based commercially available foods, I know that some species are very particular about the kinds of algae they consume as tadpoles. 



james67 said:


> are the females getting eggbound? i heard this on a program about atelopus, but i hadnt heard of this occurring with amphibians, until then (i remember this issue from my time with chams however)
> 
> james


This occurs in tomato frogs as well, it quite difficult to get females of most tomato frog species to deposit eggs without the use of hormones, I believe the same thing is also true for Ceratophrys.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

ghettopieninja said:


> zeteki have proven to be much easier to care for in captivity than other atelopus, I think a lot of this is due to the fact that it was zoos that brought them into the country and therefor their condition when they arrived here was much better. Also unlike many species they appear to need no 'trigger' to deposit their eggs and are less likely to become fatally eggbound. Also the tadpoles will take a variety of algae based commercially available foods, I know that some species are very particular about the kinds of algae they consume as tadpoles.
> 
> 
> 
> This occurs in tomato frogs as well, it quite difficult to get females of most tomato frog species to deposit eggs without the use of hormones, I believe the same thing is also true for Ceratophrys.



The problem with the Atelopus collected for the pet trade is that they are collected from the breeding streams where the females may not have deposited thier eggs. This results in egg binding (which is reported in other anurans and amphibians in general) if they are not allowed to deposit the eggs (but the recent imports often die from stress and poor nutrition if you try to breed them).. 

Zeteki and varius have done well not because the zoos collected them but the intensive work done to keep them alive and good condition before they returned with them to the states. 

All of the Atelopus have a similar breeding life history in which the juveniles and the females disperse into the forests (often going pretty far upland) away from the breeding habitat and utilize a different niche than the mature males. Once the females have sufficient nutrient reserves they migrate back to the breeding sites for egg deposition.. In captivity zeteki and varius will ovulate once they are sexually mature as they are kept under optimal conditions for reproduction (the failure in captivity to provide drier upland habitats has been thought to potentially be a source of "baggy jeans" syndrome in the Atelopus). 
In captivity imported female Atelopus should be seperated from the males and kept in a different habitat. Once the female has developed sufficient fat reserves (observable through the abdominal wall) increasing humidity and moisture will signal that ovulation should occur and the female should be monitored for ovulation and this will time the introduction to the males (introducing the female too early results in the male amplexing the female which will continue until the male is fairly emaciated and the female can develop sores on the feet from attempting to displace the male). 

There are significant differences in zeteki and varius tadpoles accepting fish flakes (in the wild they feed on diatoms) with as much as 80% of a hatched zeteki clutch refusing to accept the fish flakes. 

Some comments,

Ed


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

james67 said:


> that obviously hasnt been the case with the zeteki at least. all zeteki have been collected and brought to labs, to "save" them from chytrid. although if as Ed said other species are nearly impossible to breed, then i dont see a reason to bring them into captivity. im not looking for some impossible to breed animal on the brink of extinction, id try and find some lehmanni if that were the case. rather, i simply wondered if these were still around, and what people's experiences have been with them.
> 
> are the females getting eggbound? i heard this on a program about atelopus, but i hadnt heard of this occurring with amphibians, until then (i remember this issue from my time with chams however)
> 
> james


A number of the animals in the spumarius complex are lowland species and as such are not at risk of loss to chytrid. Atelopus tadpoles also require large water volumes to tadpole ratios as they require very clean water (very low nitrate levels) as otherwise they end up in the corners of the tank dying.. 

Eggbinding does occur if the females are not provided with proper habitat to deposit the eggs as adhesions form between the body wall and the eggs. I have pictures somewhere of egg binding in a old female zeteki. It also occurs in other amphibians. 

Ed


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## JJuchems (Feb 16, 2004)

This is information provided to me from a friend who is employed a local AZA facility.

He stated they do have females full of eggs, but no loss at this point. Those that do reproduce they have been instructed to destroy all eggs. The Atelopus zeteki they have are not actively part of the SSP and zoos interested in caring for this species have them. At this point I wish some of these frogs that are produced by non-SSP individuals could be released to pet trade.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

JJuchems said:


> This is information provided to me from a friend who is employed a local AZA facility.
> 
> He stated they do have females full of eggs, but no loss at this point. Those that do reproduce they have been instructed to destroy all eggs. The Atelopus zeteki they have are not actively part of the SSP and zoos interested in caring for this species have them. At this point I wish some of these frogs that are produced by non-SSP individuals could be released to pet trade.


Hi Jason,

Egg binding is in part due to the length of time the females retain the eggs, the longer the retention time the greater the risk of egg binding. 

They can't even be released to non-AZA institutions.. like Universities for research. The Panamanian Goverment was quite clear on that issue and made it part of the CITES import permit. and the loan agreements, etc as they are/were really paranoid about that due to thier cultural views on this frog (and incidences like castenoiticus and Dyscophus). 

Those toads are part of the SSP but currently have a non-breeding recommendation due to interrelatedness with the population (they are over represented at the moment) but they could get a breeding/rearing recommendation for that group if something happens to change the representation of that genetic group. Losses in a couple of facilities due to disease or other issues could easily move some of the animals up to a breeding recommendation (only some as the groups are sent out to holding institutions consist of all siblings and this is why the recommendation is to destroy the eggs). 

Ed


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## JJuchems (Feb 16, 2004)

Thanks Ed. It sound like same situation as the Kihansi Spray Toads. I need to get to Toledo to see them.


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## johnc (Oct 9, 2009)

Genuine request. Ed, do you have any peer-reviewed references for egg-binding in amphibians please? I'm interested in caudate and anuran references.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Hi John,


I'll have to dig back but I think it is referenced in Amphibian Medicine and Captive Husbandry. I also have picture of a A. zeteki that died during egg deposition due to adhesions formed on unreleased eggs. She actually deposited some of the clutch over a course of three days with some of the clutch remianing partially extruded from the cloaca. On necropsy, the eggs mass had formed adhesions and the attempt to pass them had torn some of the adhesions resulting in trauma and infection which caused the Atelopus to die despite significant medical intervention. 

Ed


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## johnc (Oct 9, 2009)

Thanks Ed. I look forward to that/those references. Please don't take this the wrong way, but is that the only proven example you've encountered? If it is, then taken in isolation it could be indicative of another condition the frog was suffering from or a phenomenon unique to that particular frog.

My reason for asking is that I very much feel that people apply reptile logic to amphibians without solid evidence. I've heard people apply "egg binding" to caudates many times with no evidence whatsoever. I've yet to hear of a single confirmed case in caudates.

Surely if this is a real issue with amphibians we would be hearing about them dropping left and right from not breeding. We don't hear that at all.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

johnc said:


> Thanks Ed. I look forward to that/those references. Please don't take this the wrong way, but is that the only proven example you've encountered? If it is, then taken in isolation it could be indicative of another condition the frog was suffering from or a phenomenon unique to that particular frog.
> 
> My reason for asking is that I very much feel that people apply reptile logic to amphibians without solid evidence. I've heard people apply "egg binding" to caudates many times with no evidence whatsoever. I've yet to hear of a single confirmed case in caudates.
> 
> Surely if this is a real issue with amphibians we would be hearing about them dropping left and right from not breeding. We don't hear that at all.


Hi John,

We would only hear about it if people routinely had necropsies performed on the animals and it tends to only occur in animals that were allowed to retain eggs for signficant periods of time (more than a year) which is not the normal case for many reproductive anurans..

The vast majority of amphibians which die outside of institutions are never necropsied and a number of those that are necropsied, how many are necropsied before decomposition occurs? 

Often amphibians that die during reproduction are passed off as dieing from stress or other causes when an underlying cause may be retention.. (not disagreeing that some things are overly generalized without understanding the differences between the taxa). 

Retention in reptiles can be caused due to a number of issues which may not apply to amphibians.. 

It is described in Amphibian Medicine without a reference to taxa... I suspect that it occurs in anurans much more frequently than other amphibians as I have also observed some gravid plethodontids retain eggs for 5 years (or more) without an issue when hormonally stimulated, while hormonal stimulation may not resolve the issue in anurans (as the complete clutch can't be passed). 

Ed


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