# Second clutch lost, wth?!?!



## Nillocean (Oct 3, 2008)

Ok so this is the second clutch I've lost in this manner. The eggs hatch, I remove the excess egg material, and place the hatchlings into a rectangular tupperware container with about an inch of distilled water and some black water extract. Within 5-6 hours the little guys are all white and obviously dead and starting to decompose. The only thing I can think of is maybe my water temp. is too low? The jugs are kept in the room with the frogs at about 77 F. So I checked the water temps and read at 67 F. Could this be the problem? Anyone had this kind of issue? Any help would be greatly appreciated. 


P.S. I AM A MURDERER AWWWWHHHH!!! My girlfriend is soooo hurt with me, this is the clutch we thought would make it


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## asilsdorf (Sep 7, 2005)

Hopefully someone more experienced will chime in. I'm no expert, I have one breeding pair and I still lose a good percentage of eggs after one year but two things stood out to me in your post. 

The first is the potential temperature differences between the eggs and the cup of water. Try preparing the tupperware container with water ahead of time and keeping it with the eggs so that they are at the same temp.

Another possibility is that the distilled water is too harsh. I know the blackwater extract will add some minerals to it, but it may still be low enough to shock the tads. I use spring water to avoid this potential problem. You could also try a product I have heard about for adding minerals to RO water I think it's called RO right.

The tads could also be weak. Sometimes it takes a breeding pair a while to start producing good froglets. What kind of frogs are they?


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## AlexRible (Oct 16, 2007)

If I may quote cartman for second 
"you shoulda done that, he was just a boy.... poor llittle fella"

Anyways don't beat yourself up about it, sometimes it take awhile to get things right.
Have you seen these videos? They have alot of good info.
http://www.expertvillage.com/video/15287_dartfrog-tadpoles-goodbad.htm


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## frogsanddogs (Jun 21, 2008)

What type of frogs are the tads from? I don't think you mentioned. Many of them if not most, will do better if each tad is placed in a separate water dish. I was once not feeling well when a clutch hatched on the afternoon I had just returned home from having surgery, so I put them all temporarily in a larger water bowl together and was going to separate them in the morning. I knew that azureus tads could be canabalistic but also find they don't eat much if anything the first day they go into the water and I added some flakes of food just in case, but by the next morning all but one were dead and he was near death. It was obvious there had been some sort of chemical or hormonal effect at work... so I read more and asked around about this sort of thing and sure enough, many dart tads can emit a hormone that will stunt the growth (and from my experience maybe also kill?) other tads in the same water as them... so yet another reason to put each tad in his own water bowl. The parents normally do this in selecting separate bromeliads or water deposit locations for different tads... so perhaps this is what happened? 

Often it takes the frogs a number of clutches to produce viable offspring. I think this is most often seen in the eggs not making it, but I have also had certain batches of eggs make it to being tads, but where most of that particular clutch will die as tads. I label each of my petri (egg deposit dishes) with the date the eggs were laid and then each tad dish with that original egg date and also the hatch date in which they went into the water and any other pertinent information such as developmental milestones, difficulties or strengths that make them outliers, etc... this allows me to easily track similarities or patterns- such as the fact that while a whole clutch of eggs might make it to being tads, we might also loose mostly that whole clutch randomly at different times... since they are not all dying the same day and it is only a few tad deaths among many live tads, I would probably never have noticed that they were all from the same egg clutch had I not labeled their dishes with this information. It is very interesting from an observational standpoint and allows me to monitor the health and development of the babies to easily separate and isolate if anything is out of the ordinary and makes it easy to spot patterns among a particular clutch or other seemingly (but not really) such random events. 

Also if you provide the type of frog it will probably be easier for others to give you more advice/ experience/ etc. 

In case hearing someone elses tad process is helpful... When any eggs I am raising hatch, I allow them to wiggle loose from their egg sack with the help of a little aged tap water before moving them each into their own water bowl. Each water bowl has aged tap water with a piece of an Indian Almond Leaf broken into it... the tanins from the leaf leach into the water and create a tea for the tad.... I don't actually feed them other than the piece of a leaf and resultant tadpole tea until a day or two after they hatch and go in there... I find even the weak ones tend to get a lot stronger this way and then I begin introducing fish food and other varied foods after the first day or two while still leaving the piece of almond leaf in there for them to also nibble on and to hide underneath. 

I do partial water changes whenever there is a build up of poo or food by suctioning this waste and some of the water out and just changing/ replacing about 1/3-1/2 of the water at a time. As they get bigger and make a lot more waste after they have gotten back legs, I often do more full water changes. 

Look and see how others do it with the type of frogs you are keeping... everyone has a little different method and you will need to decide what you feel most comfortable with and once you establish that and know you are doing something within the workable norms, be patient and don't blame yourself... sometimes the frogs just need time to get things right... and when they do, it will be well worth the wait as it is SUCH a cool process to watch and so exciting to see that first froglet coming out of the water.

Good luck and enjoy!
Marissa


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## MzFroggie (Mar 22, 2008)

I am no expert either. But it may indeed be the water. I don't think distilled water is recommended for use at all with pdf's. I remember reading about the water issues and spring water,RO,and aged tap water where the only ones recommended. But again I am no expert and there may be another issues.But good luck next time.It takes time to get everything down to a science.


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## melissa68 (Feb 16, 2004)

Try using less water. 

Initially I only use enough water to cover the tads + that much again. If I use too much water, I find I loose too many.

You might try this as an alternative. When the eggs hatch in the petri dish, get all the excess junk out of the dish. Replace the water (don't add in black water extract) and keep them in there for a few more days until they are active. 

By doing the above, I will occasionally loose a tad or two to cannibalism - and that is usually because I get too busy and don't get them out of there in time and they eat up their own yolk sack and go munchin' on their brothers and sisters. Rarely will I loose anymore than that. 

Once you know the egg sack has been absorbed (the body shape changes as well as the color of the tummy) (you will usually notice little tirds in the water), they don't have any external gills, etc... move them to a bigger containers. I never use bw extract - instead I use oak leaves or sphagnum in the containers. Once all this has been done, they get their first light meal.


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## melissa68 (Feb 16, 2004)

Take it easy. If we all looked at our successes and failures in this way some of us would be considered mass murders. 



Nillocean said:


> P.S. I AM A MURDERER AWWWWHHHH!!! My girlfriend is soooo hurt with me, this is the clutch we thought would make it


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## melissa68 (Feb 16, 2004)

Distilled water is fine. I will use both. Usually I use distilled water while they are still in the petri dishes & then use aged tap when they go into the 16oz tad containers. Used to use all distilled but it became cost prohibitive. 

There is no science to this, just trial and error and figuring out what works for you. Loosing 2 clutches might seem like a lot - but it isn't. You will figure it out, just don't beat yourself up when you make mistakes or you loose tads. 

The possibility always exists they were not going to live anyway.



MzFroggie said:


> I am no expert either. But it may indeed be the water. I don't think distilled water is recommended for use at all with pdf's. I remember reading about the water issues and spring water,RO,and aged tap water where the only ones recommended. But again I am no expert and there may be another issues.But good luck next time.It takes time to get everything down to a science.


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## Nillocean (Oct 3, 2008)

Thanks guys. The tads are D. auratus 'Costa Rican'. The thing that gets me is that they all (both clutches 9 hatchlings) died in about the same amount of time, so the hypothesis that we were just weak doesn't seem to click right for me. The was no differentiation in the amount of time it took individuals in the clutch to die. They all were toast by about 4 hours, with relatively same amount of decomposition. I don't remember if i said this in the initial post but, about an hour or so after I put them into the water, they all started to turn white beginning at the tails and eventually moving toward the heads. Whereas before, in the petri dish, the tads were solid black and very healthy looking. Maybe this info will help or maybe I am just cursed. I hope it was water temperature.


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## Brian Ferriera (Nov 1, 2006)

Is the water de-chlorinated? Sounds like what I have seen with chlorine poisoning. Its one of the few things that I can think of that can kill them and make them start to decompose so fast.
Brian


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## Nillocean (Oct 3, 2008)

Its distilled... doesnt that get rid of the chlorine? .


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## basshummper (Jan 13, 2008)

distilled water is collected water vapors. Distillation gets rid of everything but H2O. you might want to try reconstituting your water with minerals or just using aged tap water like myself. it sounds like maybe your tads sucked in too much water and blew up.


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## melissa68 (Feb 16, 2004)

Distilled water shouldn't be an issue or problem. That is all I use in my spray bottles & that is what I use on my eggs.


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## RedEyeTroyFrog (Jan 25, 2008)

i use spring water and have had very very few tads die, i use distilled when the eggs are in petri dishes, and spring water for the actual tads, now ur saying that the tads turn white??, ive never seen this, i have had eggs turn white when they die, sometimes when i first move the tads to the cups they are almost lifeless for a couple days, during this time i dont feed them, i wait about 3-4 days before there first tadpole bites, good luck


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## JL-Exotics (Nov 10, 2005)

the tads are too fragile to put in deep water after they first hatch. Leave them in the petri dish and add enough water to just cover them. They can stay in the petri dish for another 3 to 5 days, or at least until they become more active and the gills have absorbed. Good luck!


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