arms!!

Like magic, arms have appeared! We got back from having dinner, and one tadpole has two tiny arms, complete with fingers, where bumps were earlier today, one tadpole has only one arm and one bump, and the third tadpole has no arms yet (the one with less developed legs, previously the largest of the three tadpoles). Pretty cool, huh?

lookit them legs!

It sure is hard to get decent photos of tadpoles swimming around inside a gallon sized glass pickle jar! It makes it that much harder that they absolutely hate the camera's red auto-focus light and try to get away from it as soon as they see me with the camera in my hands! These little guys are a lot smarter than I ever would have imagined.
They now have visible spots and markings on their faces, but you have to look really really closely to see them. It looks somewhat like freckles across their noses. The tad with the smallest legs is no longer larger than the other two.

I'm running into much resistance with the names I keep coming up with. Nobody likes my choices. I did tell DD that she could pick their names, but I can't stand it that they don't have any names yet. So I thought Marilyn, Bobby, and Jack would be good names. No dice. What about Jimi, Janis, and Elvis? Nope. Winken, Blinken, and Nod? Hippy, Happy, and Hoppy? Flip-Flop, Plip-Plop, Hip-Hop? *sigh*

here are some photos of what they look like today. The largest tadpole still has the smallest legs. The other two now have much more froggy-looking legs, and they are constantly kicking with them. Maybe if you look real close you can see the bumps where their arms will be! In the second photo, you can see the larger tadpole hoovering the floor of their jar. Filter feeders they may be, but they do suck up food particles that have fallen to the bottom.
I still have yet to find a turkey baster to clean their jar with. Wrong time of year, I suppose.

arm buds!

All three tadpoles now have tiny bumps where their arms will be! Can you see the whitish spot in the picture?

ghost arms!

I did a partial water change today (about 1/8 of what is in the jar). Not because the water was cloudy (it's not) but because of the slimy gunk in the bottom of the jar. I think I've been overfeeding them. I need to get a turkey baster to clean the bottom with, but can't seem to find one anywhere this time of year. Two of the tadpoles have what look like ghost arms starting to grow just under their skin, with a slight bump there. I'm guessing/hoping this is where the arms will sprout in just a few more days.

A tadpole's life must be dreadfully dull.

The water is no longer the least bit stinky. Smells faintly "fishy" but not stinky. But it is also not cloudy or brown or green, like the GAF handbook says it should be. I put a few algae-covered pebbles from my fishtank into the tadpole jar and am giving them a little more sunlight (*not* direct sunlight!) to see if I can get some algae growing in there for them to filter out of the water. I figure if people feed their tadpoles spinach, algae must be really good for them. They seem to really enjoy playing in the sunlight, then hiding behind the brown paper, and back and forth like a fun game. A tadpole's life must be dreadfully dull. I also added some ground up floating reptile food stick to their GAF tadpole powder. But it really seems to me that the GAF food is made of ground up reptile food sticks mixed with a little sand or something to bulk it up.
They still have no signs of arms, and just bumps on the sides of their mouths where their whiskers should be, but their legs appear to be getting larger.

quick update

Finally, the tadpoles are starting to look a little bit different, and I can tell them apart now! The smallest one is slightly darker in color than the other two, and is much more active. The largest one is the lightest color and has the least developed hind legs. The middle one, well, is in between, but looks much more like the smallest one than the larger one.

The water is not stinking nearly as bad as it was last night, so I think I did the right thing. They are pooping, so they must be eating. I think I'll cut back on how much I feed them. The booklet says one level scoop every other day.

stinky water!

peeeyoooo! Tads' water started smelling foul yesterday, very much like a compost pile that has not been turned often enough. So I made an uneducated decision to aerate their water by gently scooping up a ladle-full of water and slowly pouring it back in a few times, twice a day. I removed the plastic dome that came with the GAF box (I'll just have to be extra vigilant that no little fingers or foreign objects get into the jar), gave them some more bottled spring water and also dribbled some water out of the "bio-wheel" from my fishtank into their jar, to get some of the good bacteria growing a little faster.

I wonder if those weird dots on their backs, right behind their heads are arm buds? I have no idea where the arms will sprout, this is getting exciting! I am also shopping around to figure out what sort of permanent home they will live in once they are froggies. I believe I'm going to go with a 29 or 30 gallon glass aquarium and glass top, with the biggest, baddest Penguin Bio-Wheel filter they sell (I think it's intended for 50-70 gallon tanks, but I've read that you need to overfilter). It's much more affordable than the Whisper filter, and I have no complaints about the little one in my fishtank. Plus, they've redesigned it, and it looks like it would be more secure and help prevent escapes. I was wanting to do a natural look, but I think I'll have to go the cheap route and use terra cotta flower pots for hidey holes at least at first, with as many soft fake plants (I read that hard plastic can tear the webbing between their toes, ouch!) as I can put in there and still be able to see my froggies.

(as always, click on any pic to see a larger image)

A new home for the tadpoles!

I couldn't stand the idea of those little tadpoles swimming around in that #3 (PVC) plastic box. I know that kind of plastic leaches dioxin, and I also know amphibians are particularly sensitive to such toxins. But mostly they didn't seem so happy in there, kept bumping their heads in the corners. The little palm tree looked like it could poke a hole right through the little guys' bodies if they happened to swim too close to it, and I decided to remove it as well. Our tadpoles appear to be much happier in a glass one-gallon pickle jar. Oddly enough, the one-gallon pickle jar holds at least 1/4 again as much water as the "one-gallon" plastic box that came with the tadpoles. I poured in a nice layer of the habitat sand I bought from GAF when I ordered the TadVentures Kit. The water "bloomed" as soon as I poured it into the jar, it must have just needed a little agitation to get things going. (It means the water got cloudy as the good bacteria started to grow.) I used a plastic punch ladle to gently transport the tadpoles themselves, with as much water as the ladle would hold. All three have been more active, (lazy tad no longer spends most of its time resting on the bottom) and overall they just seem to be doing much better. I taped a piece of brown paper to the side of the jar, so they could have some privacy and hide if they wish.

They have learned to be afraid of the camera, so it is already getting harder to take photos. I'll have to stop until there's something new to show. They don't like the red light the camera uses to auto-focus, and now they run away as soon as they see the camera, before I even try to take a photo!
Oh, and with some further research, I now realize that my plans to house them in a 10 gallon aquarium will not be adequate. To be fair, some websites say it is, some don't. I think it makes sense that too small a tank will stress them and shorten their lives so I'm going to err on the side of caution instead of possibly having to buy another larger tank when they outgrow the first one.

"They look more like fish than frogs. Are you sure they're tadpoles?"

Click on any of the images to see a larger picture! My apologies for the fuzziness, still getting the hang of my digital camera, and their home is a clear plastic box that distorts everything if seen through the wrong angles.

Well, they seem to be okay. When we put them in their new home, it didn't take very long before one of them started bouncing around, and a little later, swimming in one place, head down. The info booklet that came with them says this means they are happy tadpoles. A few hours later, the second one started bouncing around, too. What's funny is when they bounce on each other's heads. They don't like that much, apparently, and that's the most active they ever get. The third one is still spending most of its time resting on the bottom, but is occasionally seen floating head down, happy tadpole style. They are all identical, except one has slightly more substantial hind legs than the others - that one was the second to acclimate to the new home.

I set everything up exactly as the booklet instructs. I had to go to the store and purchase spring water. I let the water and the tadpoles sit for an hour (well, probably more like two hours because the piano movers came with our new-to-us piano) to adjust to the temperature in our house. I put the water, decorations, tadpoles, and one level scoop of tadpole food in the tank. And then I posted my report yesterday. After that, I decided the water was just too clear (they are filter feeders and need cloudy, mucky water) so I gave them a tiny bit more food. It should take a couple more days before the water is right.

DD1, four years old, is too excited about the piano to care much about the tadpoles, but she did sit and watch them a while. Her comment was, "All they do is sit still and look at their reflection" (see photo) and then she said, "They look more like fish than frogs. Are you sure they're tadpoles?" DD2, not yet two, however, is absolutely mesmerized by them! I'm smitten. I can't wait to set up a big aquarium for them once they metamorphose!

:-)

They're here!

The tadpoles arrived safe and sound today, and didn't seem to be phased by the 95 degree weather we're having. Mostly they are just laying on the bottom of their tank (a yellow one, of course, as it's DD's favorite color), each in its own corner, but one is already jumping around a little. I took photos to share, if I can figure out how to post them here. The gray-brown things in the corners are the tadpoles. They already have little hind legs, and you really can see their insides like the Grow-A-Frog website said you could. DD decided to wait a while before naming them.

Rest in peace, dear Spotty

We buried Spotty in the garden, wrapped up in red tissue paper, next to DD's marigolds. She said she was sad, and I told her that even though his body is gone, he will always be with her in her memories. We talked about how he jumped and swam around, how he would glide to the bottom of the aquarium, and it made her feel better to know that he will always be with her in her memories. Now she's finally getting excited about the tadpoles, trying to think up some good names for them. I believe one will have to be Spotty. She said earlier, when Spotty first started seeming not-quite-right, that she wanted another frog and would name it Spotty, but she may change her mind between now and then.

Spotty still hasn't croaked

Spotty, the dwarf African frog, is still alive. Barely. We had decided to bury him in the garden with our flowers. He had been laying on his back in the same corner of the fish tank, not moving, all day long. But when I reached in to get him out of there, he kicked. Feebly, nothing like a healthy frog would kick, but he's not dead yet. I brought him to the surface for some air and gently put him on top of the decorative plant where he always liked to rest and where maybe it would be easier for him to come to the top for air. He has moved his legs a little bit, but other than that is exactly where I left him last night. DD is sad, but has not shed any tears for her little frog. She has seen many fish die and knows all about the cycle of life. I also told her back when we got the frog that we didn't know if he'd live very long (you just never know with petstore animals how healthy they are, how well they've been taken care of, or how old they are when you get them). *sigh* poor Spotty.... we did everything we could to make his life a little better. Maybe he hurt himself eating too many guppy babies. He sure did like snapping them up, but always left a few behind to keep the fish population steady. But I really think he's just old. He looks old. He looks like he hurts all over when he moves (well, when he was still moving the other day anyway). He eats less and less and has been getting skinnier and skinnier for a while now.

Placed my order today!

I ordered three African clawed frog tadpoles from www.growafrog.com today (TadVentures kit). Am very excited to watch them grow into froggies with my daughters! DD's dwarf african frog, Spotty, is very sick and will die any day now, and it's good to have the replacements on the way. Hopefully these will fare much better. Have been reading lots and lots about them, and apparently they are much less picky about what they eat. Plus, they grow a bit larger than the dwarf ones.