Dart Den

Caveat: Shipping is NOT easy. Shipping tadpoles / larvae is doubly hard. I would not reccommend shipping until you have read and learned quite a bit about the subject.

I will not get into the actual shipping procedure / companies ect. This is only a construction thread.

On the uncommon event that I ship tadpoles....this is what I use. It can also be used to ship some frogs like pumilio. You can drill a tiny hole in the center of the film can lid for frogs, obviously NOT for tadpoles.

1. Start with film canisters. They are still VERY much available and FREE in all parts of the USA. Walmart and some big box stores have changed slightly and some places have gone completely digital, put that just means you have to look harder. The Camera stores are still out there. Trust me. If THAT fails, there's' always eBay. Black film cans are harder to obtain because they are usually the Kodak film brand and that's the more expensive brand of film. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

I labeled them. I label everything. Some of my frogs have white sticker labels on them as well. It's probably just OCD......probably.....[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

2. Then go to home depot or Lowes ect and get a big sheet of white Light Diffuser or otherwise called "egg crate". It's found in the lighting section. Ask a stockperson.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

3. Buy a good pair of craft type wire cutters. Small size with rubber grips found in craft stores like Ben Franklins, Michaels or even tool sections of other stores. This tool is simply the BEST and EASIEST for clipping the plastic egg crate in all sorts of shapes. Forget saws, forget knives, forget all the other tools. The little clipper pliers are the best. Trust me. They even snip a nice little straight line thru the plastic.So easy.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

Snip out as many squares as you need, film canisters. You may have a tiny bit of rough edge that may score the sides of the film cans as they are being pushed into the crate but that's either no big deal or you can take a little metal craft file and de-burr the plastic. Easy as well.

4. Here they are seated nicely in their little tray. The tray will keep them nice and upright for their little journey through the mail or shipping company.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

5. Here's another cool item to be found at Lowes. An .89 cent TOTALLY clear as glass plastic box with snap on lid made by some European company . It's called a KIS container and it makes a great shipping container as well as plant grow out, frog transport, tad raising, Isopod culturing....ect ect....It's just that awesome.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

Oh....it too has more labels. These labels are computer generated with my patented "Philsuma" icon on them.....I told you it was a sickness.

6. Here's the finished box with the three film cans firmly nestled inside, ready for their journey.

7. Here's the lid. Now this little box is considered an INSERT and still needs to be placed inside another box or styrofoam shipping container depending upon the destination and time of year / weather ect. That too, will be covered in a different thread.


ENJOY and happy shipping.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

I've also heard from a couple tadpole shippers, that they believe the cylindrical canister shape and size is far easier on the tadpole that some other containers that they used - larger deli cups and other plastic cups or bowls.

Maybe the short, round size of the film can just doesn't slosh as much or it tends to spin instead of splashing.

Interesting.

Cool, send me tads to MD

dtfleming Wrote:Cool, send me tads to MD

You are in a "Tad / Frog rich zone", my friend. With Hamburg, MADS, NY and NJ frog meets all so close by.....you may not need to ever have to consider shipping.

LOL, I know Joined up on MADS. Getting some frogs, probably next weekend from someone local.

Very cool idea, Phil.

I gotta clear up the KIS thing though...

They're made here in Canada. Less than an hour from my house. Brampton, Ontario. :wink:

frogfreak Wrote:Very cool idea, Phil.

I gotta clear up the KIS thing though...

They're made here in Canada. Less than an hour from my house. Brampton, Ontario. :wink:

SERIOUSLY ??

I love those plastic boxes. I come from the old school of hard clear "Philiips" brand boxes from the late 1980's that were made an hour from MY house and they sucked and always snapped and broke due to the brittle plastic. But they were so cool because they were as clear as glass.

Now the KIS boxes are darn near as clear as glass including the lid ! That is until they stopped carrying them at KMart here in the states and they are drying up in stock.

I knew they were "European" but thought they were Swedish or something. Cool. Can you still get all the BIG sizes with clear lids ???

Believe it or not, I saw them on the forums and could never find them here, until Lowes came to Canada. Now they're everywhere. Weird eh...

The large ones with clear lids are hard to find. Most of them are blue now.

I use them for tons of stuff. The fact that they're so clear is a huge benefit!

Yep...there are some still here, but with the blue lids as well. I like the clear lids though. They are great for plant cutting propogation shoeboxes that I put up high on my Bakers racks, under the top lights.

I have use plastic lab test tubs or soda bottle preforms. They are designed to keep liquid in, then place them in plastic bags. I have seen issues with a similar method as described including a shipment being opened by postal officials due to leaking water.

http://www.teachersource.com/Chemistry/ ... _30pk.aspx


Suggested Reading:
http://pe.usps.gov/text/pub52/pub52c5_007.htm#ep203593

Edit: Preforms cost a bit more, but are worth the cost. Like I said, they are designed to hold liquid.

^^ Good info Jason.

Anyone use anything else to ship / transport tadpoles ?

I've seen some guys use plastic medical test tube type stuff with a pointy end.

Anyone ever use a 2 liter soda bottle ? I would think that would slosh around and kill the tads. The idea is less sloshing right ?

^^^ Here's what I used the ONE time (successfully) that I shipped tads.....

Philsuma Wrote:I've seen some guys use plastic medical test tube type stuff with a poiny end.

Haven't shipped tads, but I have received them and that's how they were shipped. Dark green pointy-ended tubes with screw-on lids filled as full as possible. Getting another shipment of tads in on Tuesday using the same method, hope it works as well this time as it did the last.

What species ?

D. truncatus the first time. The next shipment will be intermedius...hoping for the best.

I think you should have your fingers crossed for intermedius...

Yeah, I know...fingers and toes crossed. They are older tads and are coming from a friend who is pretty close by.

This is excellent info, saving this for reference, thanks!