# Frogs & Toads > Frogs >  Are northern leopard frogs available as pets?

## T3RR1B1L15

I was just curious as to whether northern leopard frogs (Rana/Lithobates pipiens) are available as pets. I know green frogs and bullfrogs are available, but what about northern leopard frogs? Does anyone know? Thanks.

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## hyla

Any native frog like that, green frogs, bullfrogs, gray tree frogs etc are wild caught frogs that are being sold. Each state has different regulations on this. I myself have a wild caught gray tree frog that I found myself many years ago. I have seen grays at a local pet store being sold in the same tank as green tree frogs (which is a no no) and they just do not look healthy. I have never seen a leopard frog at a pet store.

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## Rat The Unloved

Seems like about once a year I find myself raising Leopard Frog tadpoles from a local bait shop. I'd suggest, honestly... asking at any place that sells live minnows whether they have any tadpoles. I'm not sure whether mine are Northern or Southern, but they sure are easy to find!

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## Froggiefressh

The local pet shop I go too (just for food occasionally) sells leopard frogs for $11.99 They keep the Leopards with chubbys and white tree frogs...Makes me sad  :Frown:  Also makes me want to buy every frog from them to keep them safe..I wish I could

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## SkeletalFrog

> Seems like about once a year I find myself raising Leopard Frog tadpoles from a local bait shop. I'd suggest, honestly... asking at any place that sells live minnows whether they have any tadpoles. I'm not sure whether mine are Northern or Southern, but they sure are easy to find!


In Northern Leopard frogs, the dark spots have a light border, while the dark spots in Southerns don't.  Of course, it could also be one of several other species of small Ranid.

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## lindsayshocking

Is there a particular reason you want a Northern Leopard Frog? I recently added 3 Southern Leopard Frogs to my family and I absolutely love them. Plus Southern Leopard Frogs don't get as big as Northern Leopard Frogs so that makes housing them a bit easier.

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## somuchpaint

> I recently added 3 Southern Leopard Frogs to my family and I absolutely love them. Plus Southern Leopard Frogs don't get as big as Northern Leopard Frogs so that makes housing them a bit easier.



I would be interested in any information you could give me on caring for Southern Leopard Frogs.  I have two tadpoles (with hind legs) that I am pretty sure are Southern Leopards, and I am trying to set up a proper adult habitat for them before they get their front legs.  

I have an empty 40 gallon breeder, and was hoping to make some sort of half-land half-water set-up.  Is this ridiculously large for two Southern Leopard Frogs?

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## lindsayshocking

> I would be interested in any information you could give me on caring for Southern Leopard Frogs.  I have two tadpoles (with hind legs) that I am pretty sure are Southern Leopards, and I am trying to set up a proper adult habitat for them before they get their front legs.  
> 
> I have an empty 40 gallon breeder, and was hoping to make some sort of half-land half-water set-up.  Is this ridiculously large for two Southern Leopard Frogs?


40 gallons is a large cage, but it's always better to have bigger than smaller in my opinion. After they metamorphose, you might want to keep them in a smaller cage while they're froglets. The half and half set up is definitely recommended for these little guys, as they love their water (I previously was more accustomed to tree frogs and toads, so this was quite the transition). What I did was instead of doing the exact 50/50 set up, I got two large water dishes for them. Sometimes you can get great bargains if you get dog food dishes, although they aren't quite naturalistic. It's a lot easier for me to change the water. These guys need treated de-chlorinated water, so to me this makes it a lot easier to make sure their water stays clean.

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## somuchpaint

Thanks for the reply!  It now seems that I will have three frogs (I made a post about it), so bigger is better.  

A few years ago, I did lots of reading up on salt water aquariums, and became really interested in the use of live rock and sand as part of the filtration.  Now I wonder if it would be possible to made a naturalistic-functional setup for frogs (understanding that it will NOT be no-maintenance).  

Maybe, starting on the left back corner, there will be a reptile filter set up like a waterfall, maybe going down a "stream" of smooth pond rocks (too big to swallow) diagonally towards the front middle of the tank.  On either side of the waterfall (and under the stream) will be the land portion.  I read that leopard frogs like to dig, so I'd want several inches of softer substrate (something that plants will grow in).  Maybe I could put a few earthworms in there, to be a surprise meal.  Under the softer substrate would be loose rock, going down to a false bottom, so water could flow under it to the corner filter-waterfall.  The right side of the tank would just be water, sloping up to the land portion with smooth stones.  I don't know what to put on the bottom, since I'd like to have plants, but I don't want to interfere with water flowing to the left side of the tank.  I'd like to have a few guppies in the water.  They'd be fun to watch, and would eventually serve as frog food.  No guppies, though, until the frogs are really frogs (and not tadpoles).  

I can certainly see, though, the benefits of using dog water dishes for easy maintenance.  This gives me a lot to think about.  Would the more-water with a turtle filtration system be easier to maintain?  Or would it just be really, really dirty, because of the substrates being knocked into the water?

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## lindsayshocking

> Thanks for the reply!  It now seems that I will have three frogs (I made a post about it), so bigger is better.  
> 
> A few years ago, I did lots of reading up on salt water aquariums, and became really interested in the use of live rock and sand as part of the filtration.  Now I wonder if it would be possible to made a naturalistic-functional setup for frogs (understanding that it will NOT be no-maintenance).  
> 
> Maybe, starting on the left back corner, there will be a reptile filter set up like a waterfall, maybe going down a "stream" of smooth pond rocks (too big to swallow) diagonally towards the front middle of the tank.  On either side of the waterfall (and under the stream) will be the land portion.  I read that leopard frogs like to dig, so I'd want several inches of softer substrate (something that plants will grow in).  Maybe I could put a few earthworms in there, to be a surprise meal.  Under the softer substrate would be loose rock, going down to a false bottom, so water could flow under it to the corner filter-waterfall.  The right side of the tank would just be water, sloping up to the land portion with smooth stones.  I don't know what to put on the bottom, since I'd like to have plants, but I don't want to interfere with water flowing to the left side of the tank.  I'd like to have a few guppies in the water.  They'd be fun to watch, and would eventually serve as frog food.  No guppies, though, until the frogs are really frogs (and not tadpoles).  
> 
> I can certainly see, though, the benefits of using dog water dishes for easy maintenance.  This gives me a lot to think about.  Would the more-water with a turtle filtration system be easier to maintain?  Or would it just be really, really dirty, because of the substrates being knocked into the water?


To be honest, all my other frogs are mostly desert dwellers or tree frogs, so I haven't dealt with filtration systems much. What I can tell you based on my three is that yes, they burrow a lot (when I got home today, I thought Essie got out because I couldn't find her...turns out she had completely burrowed!) which means they get substrate everywhere. I'm constantly washing substrate out of the water dishes. I'm not certain how the turtle filtration system would work with that.

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## chad frost

I have a northern leopard frog and he is a real joy.  i love him/her  he is only three weeks old and is big as a treefrog

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## somuchpaint

> To be honest, all my other frogs are mostly desert dwellers or tree frogs, so I haven't dealt with filtration systems much. What I can tell you based on my three is that yes, they burrow a lot (when I got home today, I thought Essie got out because I couldn't find her...turns out she had completely burrowed!) which means they get substrate everywhere. I'm constantly washing substrate out of the water dishes. I'm not certain how the turtle filtration system would work with that.


I took your advice (at least for the time being) and have my two southern leopard frogs in a few inches of coconut fiber bedding (soaked to expand) with an easy-to-crawl-out-of water dish, all in a 40 gallon breeder.  I have some magnolia leaves, collected and washed in water by my daughter, and baked in the oven until I was worried they were going to burn, in one corner.  One of them prefers to hide under the leaves.  The other spends much of its time in the water dish.  (The third one died before I had a chance to move them.  It had some wounds received as a tadpole.)

I am finding it simple to rinse out and refresh their water bowl.  It does collect substrate, but not too badly.  It will probably be worse when they are bigger.

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