I have mostly had experience in keeping fish but i was thinking about branching out into amphibians a bit. I was thinking about trying fire belly newt or dwarf frog. What is a suitable temperature for these. Would they be fine outside in my Koi Pond or would i need a heated indoor tank?
fire belly newt
- Thread starter aaronmac
- Start date
Low temps, under 70. Do not provide a heater. Newts will walk out of a pond, scale glass, and conquer cords. Escape proof enclosures are essential.
i did read that they shouldn't be combined due to the fact that the Frog carry's the deadly chytrid fungus which could kill the newt. I thought i had read on a couple of other sites that Fire Belly newts were suitable for outdoor ponds (assuming they were made escape proof) and preferred fairly cold water in the native range but i might be mistaken about that. I am located in Southern canada so its quite possible our temps. would be beyond their tolerance although i haven't been able to find much info on the minium low temp. tolerance. I do have a couple of spare tanks inside if need be.
Welcome to the herp world. Most of them are quite slippery and good at escaping, so secure tanks are a necessity(generally), mixing is a bad idea too. By the way, chytrid affects amphibians as a whole, not just frogs.
True, keeping this species outdoors is not very worth it, specially considering that you wont be able to see them 90% of the time and the risk of them escaping are high. Expossure to extreme temps is as well a big concern.snakefin;4729932; said:
As for chytrid fungus, it affects in a assimptomatic kind of way Xenopus(they become carriers but dont get sick from it) and it makes sick dwarf clawed frogs as well as any species of frog that it didnt have contact with in the past or that has its inmune sistem compromised. As for the rest of the amphib species well...it is supossed to make them sick, however I never herd of any other species outside Anura gettng sick from it. I begin to think that the Chytric fungus thing is all a big conspiracy of some kind
Some stuff of the "world amphibian crisis" simply doesant fit.coura;4730843; said:
You can't tell if a frog has chytridmycosis unless you take a swab for a PCR test, lots of healthy looking frogs have carried this fungus. All animals are potential carriers of this fungus, it can attach itself and lay dormant for some time until it finds another wet enviroment. Caudates will carry the fungus, though it doesn't seem to effect them the same way it does frogs or toads. In fact, a lot of imported caudates are testing positive for chytrid. They potentially could do the most harm to captive collections, as visually healthy appearing animals are passed through hands much faster than animals that may appear ill. Imagine all the hands that infected animals come in contact with along the way from collection to the retail in of the pet trade.
For the OP... Unless you wish to provide a cool enviroment for keeping newts, it's proabably better to go with the frogs.
No you dont understand, dwarf clawed frogs unlike normal clawed frogs Xenopus, do get sick from Chytric on contact and thats the reason people some times buy them and after a wille, some previously healty looking ones die unexpectadly. They dont become assimptomatic carriers unless you consider the space that goes between the beggining of the infection to its end, but that isnt qualified as such because the simptons are there, even if hard to detect. In my experience the frogs go increasingly thin and the skin gets a milky hue, before they go down hill.David Tobler;4730946; said:
This means that if you have someone that has kept a group of dwarf clawed frogs for like 2 mouths, that means they are chytric free as the patogen if present would have already have caused infection and loss of animals.
This is the info Ive gattered so far and seen first hand evidence of, however considering the large range of this genus Im open that some populations/species of dawrf clawed frogs indeed are resistent to chytric and become assimptomatic carriers like Xenopus do.