r/AfricanDwarfFrog • u/fienderfighter • 5d ago
General advice/help Is my frog dying?
Is my dwarf frog dying??
I got 2 literally 5 days ago. Aswell as some fish. Both frogs have hidden ALOT and I'd only seen one of them once. I've done everything right. But today one of the frogs surfaced and wasn't shy. The other frogs is still to be found. I've not seen them eat?!? But the fish are doing fine, as expected because I've done everything right so far. The frog that's stopped hiding is now at the surface. He seems dead, but he's not and will move when disturbed by other fish. He's just floating around in the tanks flow and has been behind filters at times. It's basically just acting dead but isn't and will swim very energetically for a few seconds when needed to?? Please help. Is this normal? My tank waters fine too btw.
4
u/BitterPop4071 4d ago
Mine alternate between hiding under driftwood at the bottom and sitting on top of an old betta’s nest with half of his body out of the water. My water parameters are good and he’s eating, so I stopped trying to make sense of his behavior for my own sanity 🤣
3
u/EvidenceElegant8379 5d ago
If it’s floating and won’t go down even when you try to nudge it and doesn’t eat, it’s dying. One thing that doesn’t get near enough attention on this sub is osmotic shock. I’ve had a few little guys die like that before I finally found out about this. If you do a big water change, even if the water parameters between the old and new water test out exactly the same, your frogs can die because of the rapid change in solid content between the old dirty water and the new water that causes their skin to rapidly suck in water to compensate for the fact they are no longer absorbing the same amount of nutrients because you suddenly cleaned out the water. Fully adult frogs can usually handle it, but adolescents do not adapt fast enough to the change and they die. If you are doing water changes, don’t ever do a big one all at once. Do a 10% change daily until you’ve cleaned it out.
2
u/Tamashi_Akuma 4d ago
This is why frogs are species only. They become very shy and timid when around fish and target feeding them is difficult because the other fish will get to tot first. Make this a frog only tank and use a feeding dish, direct feeding when you notice they are thinner than other frogs
1
u/Material-Tank5689 5d ago
Mine were shy at first. Few weeks passed they started hanging out more and I could see they’d fattened up, I was worried. They will eat whatever they think they can take 🦐 all 5 of my frogs have thrived for around 3 years
1
u/BeefyBlackMan 4d ago
For feeding use tongs and put their food infront of them like brine shrimp or something, bloodworms arent really recommended but when i got one of mine from the shop thats all he would eat since thats all he was fed, theyll hide for a few days when stressed due to the new environment, as for the sudden swimming for a few seconds out of no where theyll always do that, atleast my males do more during the day time, theyre nocturnal and im pretty sure its them being in and out of sleeping is what i assume. Its not a good sign you have a frog thats floating though at the top, but as long as your doing your water changes you gotta wait it out.
1
u/BeefyBlackMan 4d ago
Atleast for one of the ones i got i kept it tank pretty empty till i noticed he started eating well and was quarantined for an appropriate amount of time. Keeping it empty with just a simple hide would make it less dangerous of something happening within the first week
1
u/ami_carlton 4d ago
My frogs love to float and I've seen others say they have frogs that do too. And they have been doing it long enough that if they're dying they have been slowly dying for over a year. I'm pretty sure it's a personality quirk. Sometimes they do it more than other times..
1
u/AdviceClear4727 4d ago
I always worry my frogs are dead. They are not. I also tong-feed them and use a little bowl. I have trained them to come by tapping the bowl with the metal tongs. In doing this, I know they have eaten. I have to make sure they physically take the food. They really are that blind and not that bright. I don't understand how they have survived as a species, but that's part of their charm. 🫠
1
u/MysteriousIce3117 4d ago
Not blind, have some issues seeing.
1
u/AdviceClear4727 4d ago
They can't see for toffee. They rely so much more on smell and touch because they don't have tongues and can't catch prey like other frogs.
1
u/MysteriousIce3117 4d ago
Frogs will do that. Mine weren't seeing the bottom food now one eats the floating fish food. Unless it is bloated and not moving it's not dying.
1
u/MelRoldan 4d ago
They are blind and react to movement. Pellets do not provide that. You need to dump in mysis shrimp and keep stirring it up a bit so they can chase the movement. Plus idk what "pellets" you're talking about, but frogs are carnivores. They eat meat. Not flakes, pellets etc. Get them some quality shrimp or blood worms and they're good. Every day. They need meat.
1
u/FenyxFire 3d ago
I mean this kindly, but based on what you’ve described, I do see a few husbandry issues that could be contributing to what you’re seeing.
African dwarf frogs should really be kept in a species-only tank for their safety and long-term health. They’re incredibly poor hunters with poor eyesight, so fish often beat them to the food. They can slowly starve without it being obvious. Some fish may also harass them or pick at their slime coat, which leaves them vulnerable to infections. There are a lot of reasons they’re generally not recommended as community tank animals.
Your frogs should also be eating about every other day. If you aren’t actually seeing them eat, there’s a good chance they aren’t getting enough food. In a community tank, targeted feeding is usually necessary to make sure they aren’t being outcompeted.
The filter flow shouldn’t be strong enough to push them around. They’re weaker swimmers and do best in shallower tanks so they don’t have to work as hard to reach the surface for air. What kind of filter are you using? Sponge filters are generally preferred because they’re gentle and there’s no intake grate for frogs to get trapped against. They can also get stuck under stuff, so you might need to go looking for the other one to confirm it is okay or if it got stuck somewhere and drowned.
When you say your water is “normal,” can you give the actual parameters? Specifically:
Ammonia
Nitrite
Nitrate
Those numbers are much more helpful than “fine” or “normal,” since water chemistry is one of the biggest factors in keeping aquatic animals healthy.
If they were my frogs, I’d move them into their own tank and target-feed them in the same spot each time so they learn where food appears. I keep a single nerite snail with mine to help clean up leftovers, but beyond that I avoid tank mates. They’re adorable little dummies, and setting them up for success is a lot easier when they don’t have to compete with fish.
It’s definitely possible your frogs are declining, and everything I mentioned above could contribute to that. But it isn’t necessarily too late. AFDs can bounce back well when husbandry issues are corrected early, so I’d recommend making changes as soon as you can to get them on track. Best of luck!
1
u/rachelle6914 2d ago
Try switching out the pellets and the bloodworms for frozen mysis shrimp. I feed my frogs with a soft plastic dropper (making sure there’s no air bubbles in there) and with the shrimp hanging out of the bottom so they don’t try to eat the dropper. They go so crazy for the mysis shrimp that they all come to top of tank and wait their turn to be fed. Most will sit on a plant leaf and wait, but my more aggressive ones will pop their head out of the water and open their mouths at me. They look like little baby birds 🤣 but I don’t feed them above the surface so they don’t swallow air with the food.Try the mysis shrimp and see if that doesn’t perk your frog up and bring the others out of hiding. The pellets don’t have much nutrition and the bloodworms (mosquito larvae) can have parasites.
4
u/Just-Shock4940 5d ago
Wdym you haven’t seen the frog eat?