# Auratus foot rot



## aleksa_mrki (Feb 8, 2021)

1. What species ? How long have you had the frog(s) and where did you acquire them ?
Dendrobates auratus, ive had it for more than 6 months. I have bought it at an reptile expo.

2. What are your temperatures (day and night - highs and lows) and how do you measure those temperatures? Does the vivarium have any supplemental heating, and if so, what type?
Tank does not have any supplemental heating, lows are about 22°C and highs are at most 28°C

3. What lighting is on the enclosure (brand, type, wattage) and does the lighting add heat to the vivarium?
Regular LED light bulb, doesnt add heat to the vivarium

4. What is the Humidity like (percentage or guesstimate)? What type of water are you using? What is your misting procedure (automated or hand mister, how long and how often)?
I am using bottled water, I mist by hand not so frequently. Humidity is between 60 and 90% depending on the part of the tank.

5. Describe your tank/enclosure and its lid or top, and give details about the ventilation (how many vents, where are they positioned, how large are they).
Theres one big vent on the top back of the tank, the tank is custom made from glass

6. What kind of food are you providing, how much and are you dusting it? What superfine powdered supplements (brand and exact product name) are you using and are they fresh (i.e. how long has the container been open, and how is it stored)?
I feed with springtails, baby isopods and baby crickets. I use off brand calcium from my local reptile breeder. I havent used calcium in the last two months, since my source doesnt have it and i cannot find any for sale that isnt for dogs.

7. Any other animals in the enclosure currently or recently? Tankmates / other frogs ?
Isopods, springtails and a few crickets that escaped the frog long enough that are now too big to be eaten. I remove them from the vivarium when I manage to catch them.

8. Any type of behavior you would consider 'odd' ?
As stated in the youtube video by a forum member, the frog is spending most of the time on a dry part of the tank (a big plant leaf) as seen on the pics

9. Have you handled or touched the frogs recently ? Any cleansers, paint, perfumes, bug sprays etc near the tank ?
No and no

10. Take pictures of EVERYTHING -- the frogs, the enclosure, the vents. Take numerous pics of everything - that will be of great help.























Note: pic of the tank is a couple months old.

So basically, last night I saw that my frog has foot rot. Its behaving normal, hunting and moving around the tank, just spending more time on the leaf that is almost always dry, as opposed to its usual hiding spot on the higher spots in the vivarium that it can climb onto. I do have a shallow water dish in there and sometimes it enters it, chills in there for a few mins and leaves it(before and after I observed that it has this injury). I do have to say that in the last month or two I didnt pay nearly as much attention to my animals since some exams started and I have been pretty stressed out and dont have any spare time. 
I cant take it to the vet since there arent any for exotic animals where I live, and I am almost 100% sure no one in the whole country doesnt have experience with dart frogs since you cant even buy them in my country and rarely anyone keeps them. I had to go to a neighboring country just to buy my frog. 
About an hour ago I moved the frog to a clear plastic tub with a damp paper towel, a hiding spot, a spot where it can climb to where its dry and a small improvised water dish, since its more sterile than my tank. I do intend to change the paper towels every other day just in case. 
I only have this one frog in the tank frog-vise, since it was an experimental frog of sorts to see if it enjoys my conditions, and if it does I was planning to buy more. Everything was great until yesterday.
I do agree as stated in the video that my substrate was too damp and not enough leaf litter, but the higher levels that the frog can climb to are drier. 
My main questions are:
-Could this be an injury caused by the big crickets that are still in the tank
-What else can i do to up the chances of my frogs survival and recovery? I will try to find silver sulfadiazine, is there anything else I can do? 
Thank you in advance.


----------



## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Hopefully someone has good advice about the foot itself. I don't, but the silver sulfadiazine sounds like a good place to start. And get the crickets out, and don't feed them at all anymore -- they absolutely could be part of the problem.

A couple other things:



aleksa_mrki said:


> I use off brand calcium from my local reptile breeder. I havent used calcium in the last two months, since my source doesnt have it and i cannot find any for sale that isnt for dogs.


I think you can get items shipped into your country ("the internet" says it is possible through regular sorts of shippers). If you could list the ingredients of the supplement you're using, we could say how good or bad it is, but proper supplementation is very important.

Also: your country is a party to CITES, and if you drove a dart frog into the country that is a violation of CITES (all Dendrobatids are CITES listed). How big a deal that is legally for you I don't know (if they're not sold in the country, that's a red flag), but it is strongly discouraged, as it affects the entire hobby and all keepers negatively.

It looks like the viv doesn't have much ventilation. I don't see a low vent (is there one?) and the top vent is pretty small. That's possibly a contributing factor to the foot issue. You mention a video about this; providing a link would help.


----------



## aleksa_mrki (Feb 8, 2021)

Socratic Monologue said:


> Hopefully someone has good advice about the foot itself. I don't, but the silver sulfadiazine sounds like a good place to start. And get the crickets out, and don't feed them at all anymore -- they absolutely could be part of the problem.
> 
> A couple other things:
> 
> ...


My country is pretty strict about import, so i dont think it would look good for me to import a container of white powder lol. I will try to souce some better quality calcium asap. 
Dont really know about CITES, and to be honest, didnt really check. I do know some breeders sold young darts a couple of years ago, so i doubt it would be illegal here. I dont really even flaunt my pets, i got it for my own enjoyment, so i dont think it will really impact anyone. Thanks for the heads up anyway. 
I will try to improve ventilation in the future, I thought the top back vent was enough. Just need to figure out how to add more without breaking the tank apart.
Heres the link:


----------



## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

aleksa_mrki said:


> I dont really even flaunt my pets, i got it for my own enjoyment, so i dont think it will really impact anyone.


People who keep track of this sort of thing (academics, wildlife agents, legislators) read forums such as this one. These data make their way into policy. Yes, it impacts people. My country is a minefield of wildlife laws, many of them misguided and plain stupid, that are motivated in part by data like these. The more responsible herp owners are overall, the fewer foolish laws I have to contend with. Yes, it impacts people. 

For information about what to look for in a dart frog supplement, this thread might help. It may be that the product you're currently using hits all the bases, but you'd need to compare the ingredients to the requirements for frogs to find out.


----------



## Fahad (Aug 25, 2019)

Silver Sulfadiazene is great -- it requires a prescription from either a vet or your very understanding family physician with whom you've been transparent. In the USA it's called Silvadene, in Canada it's Flamazine, I don't know what else it's called. In the past I've successfully headed off a much less severe case with Polysporin, but as far as I know the Silver Sulfadiazene is superior as it targets more (as in multiple) pathogenic organisms than Polysporin can, but I'm not a vet and may be getting that completely wrong, perhaps someone with more accurate knowledge can correct me.


----------



## aleksa_mrki (Feb 8, 2021)

Socratic Monologue said:


> People who keep track of this sort of thing (academics, wildlife agents, legislators) read forums such as this one. These data make their way into policy. Yes, it impacts people. My country is a minefield of wildlife laws, many of them misguided and plain stupid, that are motivated in part by data like these. The more responsible herp owners are overall, the fewer foolish laws I have to contend with. Yes, it impacts people.
> 
> For information about what to look for in a dart frog supplement, this thread might help. It may be that the product you're currently using hits all the bases, but you'd need to compare the ingredients to the requirements for frogs to find out.


Sorry, I didnt look at it that way. I looked at it from the perspective that i bought a captive bred frog, that is sold in my neighbouring country a few hours away. I will check my laws and regulations regarding this.


----------



## IShouldGetSomeSleep (Sep 23, 2021)

Here's an example of the kind of thing Socratic Monologue was talking about > https://www.traffic.org/site/assets/files/13362/seasia-amphibian-pet-trade.pdf Attempting to use internet and social media to quantify which animals are being sold and such.


----------



## JasonE (Feb 7, 2011)

Fahad said:


> Silver Sulfadiazene is great -- it requires a prescription from either a vet or your very understanding family physician with whom you've been transparent. In the USA it's called Silvadene, in Canada it's Flamazine, I don't know what else it's called. In the past I've successfully headed off a much less severe case with Polysporin, but as far as I know the Silver Sulfadiazene is superior as it targets more (as in multiple) pathogenic organisms than Polysporin can, but I'm not a vet and may be getting that completely wrong, perhaps someone with more accurate knowledge can correct me.


I cured a very mild case of foot rot in a terribilis with neosporin. However I caught that within a day of it showing up. 

OP, you're going to need to find a vet. There's a good chance that frog is going to have to have her/his foot amputated. It looks pretty far gone.


----------



## aleksa_mrki (Feb 8, 2021)

JasonE said:


> I cured a very mild case of foot rot in a terribilis with neosporin. However I caught that within a day of it showing up.
> 
> OP, you're going to need to find a vet. There's a good chance that frog is going to have to have her/his foot amputated. It looks pretty far gone.


Thanks for the input. I will do my best to find one, but I highly doubt there are any unfortunatelly


----------



## tachikoma (Apr 16, 2009)

First off I'm NOT A VET so please keep that in mind, just sharing my experience in hopes that it might help you.

A few years ago one of my terribilis had developed a pretty bad case of foot rot just about as bad as your pic (terminator 2 hand). Mine was a result of a too aggressive misting schedule. I also did not have access to silver sulfadiazine at the time so I just treated it with the next best thing I had available, not ideal but I was able to cure it. The idea was to just keep the area clean and let the frog's body do the rest.

Once a day and for the initial cleaning I used Banda-SiL:
It is a propritery mix of 200ppm silver, polycationic polymers, and some amino acids. From what I understand (extremely limited) the main mechanism of action is the silver inhibits infection and promotes wound healing. The polymers are used to help coat the wound and better absorb the solution. Now I will warn you, the frog is not going to like this solution, I assume it probably stings a bit on such a serious wound. I used this on the foot once a day and a second solution at night, which is tolerated much better. As the wound heals the frog will tolerate it better and better. Once the healing is well underway, I switched to the Vetericyn Plus for both treatments as it's way less stressful on the frog.









For the evening treatment I used Vetericyn Plus Reptile Antimicrobial Wound Care Spray: I'm not sure which ingredients in this are actually doing the heavy lifting but I have used it several times in the past and it always seems to do a good job. The main reason I like this one is that it doesn't seem to bother the frogs at all so it's very easy to get good coverage of the wound.









How I applied the solution to the foot: 
I placed the frog in a fruit fly cup. I would then unscrew the spray solution bottles and use a small disposable sterile pipette to pull out enough liquid to squirt directly on the frog's foot while in the cup. Usually this would be enough to create a small puddle at the bottom of the fruit fly cup when tilted, which would ensure that even the bottom of his foot get's covered as well. You may need to rotate the cup to get the liquid to pass over his foot if the frog is moving around. After I made sure his wound was completely covered I would release him back into his quarentine tank. It should be planted and have areas that are completely dry, ideally leaf litter, a flat piece of slate and some cover like a cocohut with a petri dish. The petri dish is helpful as it keeps the frogs wound off the ground while he sleeps if using the hut.

Pic of frog's healed hand a few years later. He no longer has toepads on the toes of that foot but it's a full foot otherwise, fully functional and healed.










Hope this helps and good luck.


----------



## aleksa_mrki (Feb 8, 2021)

tachikoma said:


> First off I'm NOT A VET so please keep that in mind, just sharing my experience in hopes that it might help you.
> 
> A few years ago one of my terribilis had developed a pretty bad case of foot rot just about as bad as your pic (terminator 2 hand). Mine was a result of a too aggressive misting schedule. I also did not have access to silver sulfadiazine at the time so I just treated it with the next best thing I had available, not ideal but I was able to cure it. The idea was to just keep the area clean and let the frog's body do the rest.
> 
> ...


Thank you very much! Your experience really gave me some much needed hope. I actually bought silver sulfadiazine cream yesterday and already applied it onto the wound last night. Hoping for the best.


----------



## tachikoma (Apr 16, 2009)

aleksa_mrki said:


> Thank you very much! Your experience really gave me some much needed hope. I actually bought silver sulfadiazine cream yesterday and already applied it onto the wound last night. Hoping for the best.


Glad to hear it and really awesome that you were able to get some silver sulfadiazine cream. Definitely be sure to use that as it is much better than my solution, it should work faster and less stress to the frog.


----------



## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

tachikoma said:


> Once a day and for the initial cleaning I used Banda-SiL:
> It is a propritery mix of 200ppm silver, polycationic polymers, and some amino acids. From what I understand (extremely limited) the main mechanism of action is the silver inhibits infection and promotes wound healing. The polymers are used to help coat the wound and better absorb the solution. Now I will warn you, the frog is not going to like this solution, I assume it probably stings a bit on such a serious wound. I used this on the foot once a day and a second solution at night, which is tolerated much better. As the wound heals the frog will tolerate it better and better. Once the healing is well underway, I switched to the Vetericyn Plus for both treatments as it's way less stressful on the frog.


I couldn't find any reference to "200ppm silver" in this product. According to the NIH, Banda-Sil is a homeopathic product (10x 20x 30x dilution, the label states), and as such have no empirical support for their effectiveness. 

Vetericyn Plus is a legitimate veterinary topical wash that contains Hypochlorous Acid, a very well tolerated and effective disinfectant against a range of microorganisms in human and non-human animal medicine.


----------



## tachikoma (Apr 16, 2009)

Socratic Monologue said:


> I couldn't find any reference to "200ppm silver" in this product. According to the NIH, Banda-Sil is a homeopathic product (10x 20x 30x dilution, the label states), and as such have no empirical support for their effectiveness.
> 
> Vetericyn Plus is a legitimate veterinary topical wash that contains Hypochlorous Acid, a very well tolerated and effective disinfectant against a range of microorganisms in human and non-human animal medicine.



They may have changed the formulation as I also can't find it on the new ones online. However, on my container of it which is a few years old it says it right on the back. I guess I won't be buying any of the new ones then.


----------



## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Looks like there was an FDA action a while back regarding various OTC silver containing products that may have something to do with the change in labeling and wording.



CFR - Code of Federal Regulations Title 21


----------

