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African dwarf frogs and dwarf orange cray?


Jay
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Crayfish/crawdads are messy little critters and produce a fair amount of waste.  A general rule of thumb is 1 per 5 gallons.   In contrast, while african dwarf frogs (adf) while bumbling do not make nearly as much of a mess.

The general rule of thumb I have heard over the years and from my own experience in keeping these is 1 adf at your initial 3 gallon mark then an additional one every 1 to 2 gallons. Now adf do much better in planted tanks with hiding spaces.  With that being said that is going to take up some of the landmass.  If it was me, and I was giving them 1/2 of the tank.  I would look at doing 6 - 9 adf.  They are a social critter and do well in community.  

For your crayfish you may be safe doing 2 to 3 if there are plenty of hiding spots.  If there are not, I would most likely only do 1.

Do make sure to have the divider go all the way to the top as adf can and do jump. You do not want them crawling over to the crayfish and you do not want them jumping out.

Do make sure to treat your adf initially because there are a large number of diseases, fungi, and parasites they can come with even when captive breed.  I have used the Coop's med trio with no ill side effects for ADF.  It won't touch everything, but it will handle a lot of potential problems.    

ADF have been the only thing I have kept consecutively.  Right now I am going on 20+ years.  I know the internet often says you will only get 4  - 5 years out of them, but if you provide good care for them you should be able to get more than a decade out of your little buddies.  They can be finicky eaters.  Live food that they can found on the ground like blackworms are great.  You can soak tubifex worms then break them up in the tank until they fall down.  Blood worms are ok but in my own personal experience I really do think they might contribute towards bloat.  The new sera tabs are actually pretty well balanced and readily accepted by adf in my own experience.  To be perfectly honest adf are the only thing I know of that actually likes the new sera tabs.  And while feeding those I have been able to get a bit of breeding action out of them.  And the other dried food I have good experience with is hikari vibra bites.  When picking food for your adf you want to pick foods that have an odor to it.  They will find most of their food through smell than sight.  They have very poor vision.  

I only recommend keeping no fish or a slow moving fish with adf.  In my own personal experience, bettas or a gourami tends to do fairly well with adf.  You can get an aggresive betta or gourami, so be mindful and have a backup plan if you do.  But yeah a dwarf gourami or a betta splendid could make a great option for that side.  

Also, as long as you make it through your first year with your adf with no bloat or illness, you should be fine.  Sometimes it just happens and you will lose them unexpectantly in the first year, and this is often due to things outside of your control.

Also, if you are like me, you are going to want to feed them every day. Please don't.  They are prone to becoming overweight easily.  Getting on a schedule of every other day is perfectly fine.  If you find your frogs are becoming overweight it is ok to fast them.  I have fasted mine on  many occassions for about five days. 

Hope this helps! And yes I know it was a wall of text. Happy Saturday!

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Also a bit more than what you asked for, but typically I would recommend using a sponge filter with african dwarf frogs. They like to squeeze into things so a box filter inside the tank can be a bit hazardous.  Hang on back filters honestly produce to much flow in my opinion for them.  They like really calm waters.  

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And one more species spotlight that might help is from the wonderful and brilliant Rachel O'Leary.  Maybe not the most helpful videos but some good videos.  And I am trying to find you some videos on breeding them.

 

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