Dart Den
Serving the Dart Frog Community Since 2004...
Dart Den

Serving the Dart Frog Community Since 2004...

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Must I feed fruit flies and dust them???
#1
Must I feed Fruit flies? Don't they eat all kinds of bugs in the wild?Yes and yes. Wild prey insects of all types have a huge calcium content transferred directly to the dart frog. We can never hope to replicate the diversity of vitamins and nutrients AND calcium they get in the wild, that is why it is imperative that we use fresh, quality superfine supplements as dusted fruit flies at EVERY feeding. Failure to supplement correctly is my guess at the cause of most problems.

Fruit flies must be the staple in the hobby as they are the best possible vehicle to transfer the superfine powdered supplements to the frogs and the easiest to culture. All other feeders - bean beetles, aphids, isopods and springtails are really never able to be well dusted or predictably raised and as such, never a staple feeder insect.
If you want to try crickets as a staple or you feel lazy or unwilling to buy fresh and quality supplements and learn how to properly dust the flies...Then Dart Frogs are not for you. Please try cherry shrimps or some type of goldfish perhaps.

Fly culturing is both the easiest thing as well as the hardest thing about this hobby - you will *get* this odd quote very soon. Fly culturing has some possible off-putting smells and aspects and there will always be escapes. If someone is squeamish about bugs, escapes or possible gross thing, this may not be the hobby.

There is NO SUCH THING AS A BIOACTIVE / SELF-SUFFICENT ENCLOSURE.

There is no way that a tiny glass tank will generate rich and varied insect prey that is nutritionally sufficient for the growth of ANY vertebrate.

A diet of springtails and isopods will not be enough. That's the equivalent of you eating nothing but little debbies and hotdogs (not nearly a perfect analogy but you get the picture, or at least I hope to god you do.

Your frogs and vertebrates will suffer and die unless you give them quality dusted prey items containing the amount of calcium and vitamins that they need. You need to dust with fresh superfine supplements EVERY single feeding.

There is no single competent / long-term frog breeder than does not use melaogaster fruit flies as the staple and dust every feeding.

Nope again, A friend of mine in MD raised generations of HUGE terribilis (google it) on nothing but small melanogaster fruit flies. Will the frogs get bored with nothing but small flies. Nope. That's anthropomorphizing them, a common mistake. We cannot attempt to diversify their diet and it's more mites than ants. I know about 50 of the major breeders of dart frogs in the World hobby since 2005. I don't know of anyone who attempts to feed them any kind of roaches.
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"Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana".
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#2
100% take the time to not just jump into the hobby but also to understand what your getting yourself into. Yes it's "just frogs" but they need the proper care. Good luck with it.
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#3
for a small amount of frogs- even 1-2, I always rec 2 cx's, that way if you F up, there is a decent chance 1 of the 2 cxs will perform ok. Dart frog keeping - their food culturing is very much 'mad science' as there are so many variables. A lot of people are drawn to this as it is easier than most exotic animal hobbies to feed. But some people are annoyed at dry cat food and fish flakes and have little tolerance ect. Those people should not attempt dart frogs.
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"Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana".
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#4
If anyone has been to Costa Rica or Panama and observed the rich and diverse insect prey, then you will immediately understand that raising insect 'food' in an American basement will NEVER come close to even 10% of what is needed to produce a more complete Nutrional feeder insect. No amount of effort is going to produce a feeder insect that is barely above the level of cardboard in terms of nutrient value. THIS is why we must dust with fresh, quality superfine supplements at EVERY feeding. There is no need to apply human characteristics and think that the frogs would 'enjoy' other food. This is a silly supposition. Cats, higher mammals quite possibly. Frogs...no.
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"Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana".
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