# Rescue mission gone wrong....



## holmesese (Jan 5, 2008)

So I visited Pet Supplies plus yesterday and to my horror I saw a small half gallon critter keeper that contained a VERY skinny auratus and about a dozen inch long crickets. Needless to say, I wasn't to pleased with the state of the frog or the $55 price tag. Since I am in school I have very little $$ and couldn't afford the half dead frog. I talked to the manager of the store, who said they bought the frog by accident and that he knew it needed fruit flies but he didn't have any. The guy actually acted like he felt bad about it when I told him the frog was starving to death. I was able to talk him down to selling the frog for $25. So now the problem arises.... I can't afford to take the frog to the vet and I don't know if I should try a general treatment for parasites. The frog is in quarentine from the rest of my collection and is on a paper towel substrate with a coco hut for a hide. I gave him two days of rest then today offered a few fruit flies, he ate a few. Are there any medications that I can try to rid him of any possible parasites? Also, any other suggestions as to a way to try and get him to recover.


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## Otis (Apr 16, 2006)

any updates? i would put more hiding spots in, a few handfulls of leaves. and you don't need to use papertowel unless you are treating him, spahgnum moss would work fine too.


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## holmesese (Jan 5, 2008)

Well, the little guy (much to my surprise) has been doing fairly well. He is still kickin after a week and a half. He has a coco-hut to hide in and I sprinkle a lot of fruit flies in his container in the morning. If I put in only a few he seems not to notice them and he misses flies very often. About once every three or four tries he gets the fly he is after. After he has fed on a about four or five flies he doesn't seem to eat anymore. After a couple hours with a lot of flies in the cage I clean out almost all of the flies except a few. I figure less flies means less stress for the frog. He is still extremely skinny and doesn't appear to be gaining any weight. Still open for suggestions!!!!


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## kristy55303 (Apr 27, 2008)

the rescue mission is great. some do phrophylactic treatments, some dont. I would contact dr.frye. via email.very reasonable with pricing and will answer all your questions. how old is the dart and what kind of dart is it? Yes, definately needs more hiding spots. I like pothos cuz i can bleach them(i cup of bleach, ten cups water, 15 second dip, rinse well) and the pothos last a while....or i just boil leaf litter for a half an hour to rid pests and such. Unless you ar fecaling him/her, do away with the paper towels.they need changing every 7-10 days. I use sphagnum and leaf litter/pothos and a cochut of some sorts....even something that can just be homemade and cut out. the dart will appreciate the hiding spaces. i also add springtails to the spahgnum to help it last 2-3 weeks. Are you supplimenting the dart with proper suppliments? If the pet store was doing as you say and neglecting the dart...i hardly think they were supplimenting right. In any respect, i give you thumbs up for rescuing the feller.Any pics to post? kristy


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## holmesese (Jan 5, 2008)

Thanks! I will provide some more hides and I have been supplementing the little guy (or girl). I will try to get some pics up soon and see what happens.


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## earthfrog (May 18, 2008)

Your frog has nervous system damage---supplement with Herptivite's calcium and separate vitamin powder daily for at least a week to help counteract this---after that weekly. These are the only supplements I trust---the others combine vitamins with calcium, which reduces the amount of nutrients available for the frog. Test for chytrid fungus if he's not recovering soon---see John at Pisces Molecular about testing for chytrid, which causes nervous system damage, skin sores and eventually death in an average of 3 weeks for dart frogs.


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## edwardsatc (Feb 17, 2004)

earthfrog said:


> Your frog has nervous system damage


 :?: 
What is the basis for this diagnosis?


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## earthfrog (May 18, 2008)

edwardsatc said:


> earthfrog said:
> 
> 
> > Your frog has nervous system damage
> ...


I read it from Poison Dart Frogs by Amanda and Greg Sihler as well as other places on this and other frog boards. Missing flies repeatedly, frogs unable to climb and hop properly, dragging legs are all indicative of nervous system damage or distress. Sometimes they can recover without lasting damage, sometimes not.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

edwardsatc said:


> I read it from Poison Dart Frogs by Amanda and Greg Sihler as well as other places on this and other frog boards. Missing flies repeatedly, frogs unable to climb and hop properly, dragging legs are all indicative of nervous system damage or distress. Sometimes they can recover without lasting damage, sometimes not.



What page? 

I pulled it off the shelf and a quick scan of the Health Care Chapter or the Nutrition chapter did not pull up that specific information. 
A use of the search function here on the board also failed to pull up that they have nervous system damage if they cannot capture flies.... 
There is a condition in anurans that have been supplemented with insufficient vitamin A (hypovitaminosis of A), most typically seen in Bufonids where there is a change in the ability of the cells to secrete the sticky mucous that allows the capture of prey insects. This is referred to in the literature as Short Tongue Syndrome (Or STS) and if sufficient vitamin A is supplied to the anuran, STS will reverse itself. 

Typically the recommendation for nutritional supplementation for adult anurans is every other feeding if fed 3 or more times a week) and every feeding if fed less frequently. In the case of anurans fed 3 times or more a week, a straight calcium carbonate supplement can be used every other feeding (Dr. Wright, Personal Communication). If there is insufficient metabolization of calcium in the diet (due to a number of possible factors such as insufficient D3, insufficient calcium, too much phosphorus, hypervitaminosis of A), then neurological issues can manifest such as tremors, limb failure or seizures. In this case if there is bone deformation, it will be permanent but this is not the symptoms at hand... 

Some comments,

Ed


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## earthfrog (May 18, 2008)

Thanks, Ed. You have a very good vocabulary, by the way. The treatment is still the same, regardless if you want to call it permanent damage to the nervous system or not. This ought not become an argument. Anytime an animal's motor skills cannot function properly, something is interfering w/it's nervous system. I merely listed the places where I found my info in general, sorry you didn't find it in one of those places. Hope the frog recovers soon, and I believe it will.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

earthfrog said:


> Thanks, Ed. You have a very good vocabulary, by the way. The treatment is still the same, regardless if you want to call it permanent damage to the nervous system or not. This ought not become an argument. Anytime an animal's motor skills cannot function properly, something is interfering w/it's nervous system. I merely listed the places where I found my info in general, sorry you didn't find it in one of those places. Hope the frog recovers soon, and I believe it will.



The reason I got on this was this is the sort of thing that becomes ossified into the lore of the keeping the frogs and there is already too much of it already.....

Thanks, when you've spent a lot of the last three decades reading, its hard to not pick up some words here and there.. 

Ed


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## holmesese (Jan 5, 2008)

Thanks for all of the help, I had been dusting here and there with a vitamin supplement and went to get pinhead crickets to maybe give him a little more of a nutritional boost. However, I returned to find him barely able to move and he died later in the day. I guess that's the way it goes! But I did learn a thing or two.


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## earthfrog (May 18, 2008)

Sorry about your loss. I feel for you---I lost a juvi froglet due to stress not too long ago. 

Just for the sake of other readers, how often were you dusting the insects on average?


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## Otis (Apr 16, 2006)

sorry about the frog, it certainly sounds like you did all you could. those things just happen, but they still suck.


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## holmesese (Jan 5, 2008)

Thanks for the consolances. I had the frog a little over two weeks maybe... I dusted twice the first week, then didn't dust them anymore as I talked to a local dart breeder who said the frog might not eat as many of the dusted flies. The truth of it was that I tried to feed small amounts of flies so that I could count and see how many the frog ate. He maybe at 2-3 flies max a day... and not all were eaten as soon as they were placed in the container so much of the dust may have already fallen off.


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## Rich Frye (Nov 25, 2007)

Sorry for the loss, on many levels.
Is there a way we can pass along that as long as people take it upon themselves to "rescue" these petshop frogs we are perpetuating the horrid circle ?


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## Otis (Apr 16, 2006)

Yeah, darts don't seem to bounce back like some other frogs, and a lot of times if there is something thats wrong they will just stop eating. And the starving kills them, not what was originally wrong.


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