# will frogs over eat?



## themann42 (Apr 12, 2005)

i know with some animals, if you over feed them they will continue to eat way more than they should and could even get to the point of getting sick or dying. what about frogs? if they're full will they stop eating, or will they continue to lick up anything they see as food? will they eat so much that it's bad for them?


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## Mantellaprince20 (Aug 25, 2004)

Ever wonder why you see so many fat frogs in peoples collections now??? Haven't you seen the frogs that suffocate because they tried to eat something larger then them (not dart frogs necessarily)??? Yes, these frogs will eat. In the wild, they will have a slender shape too them, and females will get rounder when gravid. I have seen frogs though that look like marbles in peoples collections. Heck, mine will look like marbles if i fed them too much. 

Basically, I stick to feeding two small feedings every day that I feed my frogs. I usually have a feeding day, every other day, sometimes every 3 days. It is like a reef tank system, you don't need to give them food everday. We are already giving them way more then they would find in the wild on a daily basis. Then they also have springtails and what not to munch on when they don't have a dose of flies at the moment...... So, come up with a feeding cycle that you seem to feel comfortable with, and that keeps your frogs healthy.

Ed Parker


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## slaytonp (Nov 14, 2004)

Some frogs will definitely over-eat in captivity, especially given inappropriate foods, but since this is a dart frog forum, of frogs who lap up live insects with their tongues, not those who gulp and swallow stuff like pinkie mice, gold fish, and ham sandwiches on a fish line, --No-- They don't generally tend to over-eat. There are the tincs and such that tend to be eating machines, and the leucs are always hunting, but true obesity as one might find in a captive White's tree frog, is rare. In general, fat darts are healthy, happy darts. The foods we feed them, such as springtails, fruit flies, pinhead crickets and field plankton in season, tend to give them some exercise and sport. I don't think obesity and over-eating is a problem among dart frogs.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Dendrobates like other anurans are hardwired to take advantage of the periods of food abundance (in the wild the god of ffs doesn't come by and shower the devout frogs with ffs from the sky on a schedule) and will consume as much as possible (as who knows when the next batch of meals will appear again). 
In addition compared to a lot of the other insects that can make up thier diet (such as ants) in the wild, ffs are considered a calorically denser food item. 
If you checked wc frogs versus captive frogs (via necropsys) in the average collection, you would note that the captive frogs have large fat pads deposited in the abdominal cavity causing the frogs to have a rounder fatter appearence. 
I typically feed my frogs every couple of days depending on how many ffs I can see in the tank. I think it was on here where I worked out the average number of flies that needed to be fed a frog at a certain weight and temperature. 

Ed


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## slaytonp (Nov 14, 2004)

Ed-- I hope I'm not running off the subject too much, but in your studies have you ever come across health problems in captive darts that can be related to obesity?


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Hi Patty,

I have seen necropsies where the Dendrobatid had enormous fat pads as well as a very fatty liver which in other vertebrates can be caused by obesity. 

Ed


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