# tadpole sudden death-bloated stomachs?



## ritersofly

Hey I have about 2 dozen Bakhuis tinc tads developing, any where between 2 days and close to 2 months old. the two oldest died today very suddenly, when I checked on them yesterday they were fine and today I checked and I found them both white, upside down and with bloated stomachs! I feed ff's and springtails to older tads ever so often but their normal diet consists of tadpole bites and tetramin fish flakes. Yesterday i sprinkled 1-2 live ffs in their cups. they are kept in a sweater box in a room with an average temp of 75F degrees. I change water about once a week and I use indian almond leaves in each cup. here are some pics, any ideas as to why this happened? Everyone else in the bunch seems fine..










In this pic the tad is upside down so that red bump is its stomach


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## frogface

They both went around same time? If so, I would suspect temperature or something strange in the water. There is a lot of tad poo in that first picture, but then some folks don't change water at all.

I dunno.


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## Ed

The bloating is probably due to decomosition and microbial growth in the abdominal cavity. 

There are a lot of potenial causes of death but with well established animals the first place to start is with water quality.. The flies are highly unlikely to be an issue. 

Ed


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## ritersofly

thanks guys.. I changed the water a couple of days ago but I might have missed these two cups...


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## illinoisfrogs

It happens. It's rare, but every once in a while you will lose a tad. I never do water changes, and I lost probably 5 tads out of 150 in the last breeding cycle.


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## Judy S

illinoisfrogs said:


> It happens. It's rare, but every once in a while you will lose a tad. I never do water changes, and I lost probably 5 tads out of 150 in the last breeding cycle.


just out of curiosity, how large are the containers that you do not change versus the time it takes the tadpoles to get out of their container..and how large a container do you use--surface waterwise???


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