# Frogs & Toads > Dart Frogs (Dendrobatidae) > Breeding, Eggs, Tadpoles, etc >  And here we go........

## AbranV

Here's some pics of the new kids, five R.Variabillis Southern tadpoles.

Cell phone pics for now, I'll try and get some better ones with the camera soon. 

I've watched this one swim up to the surface and drag a piece of a leaf back down with it.


One of the five already developing a pattern




   Is it common for tadpoles to surface almost like a goldfish going after food?

Or blow bubbles?


Two of the five already have colors/patterns developing. Is it safe to assume they may be older? If so, by how much?

Another thing I noticed, is that the same two with spots aren't as active as the other three. Could this be due to an age difference mentioned before?



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flybyferns

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## AbranV

We made it through the first 36hrs, and everything's looking good so far. My biggest worry was getting them home and acclimated, then hoping the water chemistry wasn't too different. They ate right away, and today will be the first cleaning of their cups.

So far two have begun growing their legs, with a third joining them any day now.

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## Amy

Congrats!  Make sure you take pictures when they're fresh out of the water... That is when they are the most amazing looking!

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## Lynn

Congratulations ! 
 :Butterfly:

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## AbranV

I picked the little guys up Saturday. Its Tuesday night now and they already starting to look different. It's amazing how much has happened in the past three days.

This guys the front runner so far, he's becoming more of an arrow shape than oval, and his colors are starting to come through.

This one we nicknamed "toothless" from How to Train Your Dragon. It's hard to tell but in this pic he has two spots above his eyes that reminded us of the cartoon dragon.

This one is the oddball of the quintet. The others are dark brown/black, but this guy's extremely light in color compared to the others.


I can already tell that I'm going to have different tadpole/froglet combinations. Two are more developed than the others, then there are two more just behind them, and finally the runt of the litter. This should be interesting.

So far so good. They're fairly active, and eating well. My only concerns at the moment is regulating their temperature, and whatever's going on with the lighter colored tad. The breeder had benedicta and fantastica tadpoles also. There may be a very slim chance it could be one of them. I guess we'll see soon enough

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## James

In my experience, younger / less developed tads are more translucent....and I would suspect this is what you have.



Benedicta tads show their characteristic red when morphing and, from what I gather, fantastica show their orange when morphing....so it will be obvious when they morph is a mixup happened.

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## AbranV

> In my experience, younger / less developed tads are more translucent....and I would suspect this is what you have.
> 
> 
> 
> Benedicta tads show their characteristic red when morphing and, from what I gather, fantastica show their orange when morphing....so it will be obvious when they morph is a mixup happened.


I'm fairly sure that it's the same as the others. It's just odd that it really hasn't changed a whole lot compared to the others. It will probably darken up soon.

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## Heather

So cute! Congrats  :Smile: .

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## AbranV

UPDATE:

I've had the little guys for about 2 1/2 weeks now and they are rapidly changing, almost daily. So far they're all looking healthy, or at least I assume they are. 
Just for fun I've been keeping a daily journal monitoring their progress along with monitoring their temps, feedings, water changes etc. 
Can you say official frog nerd yet?

My observations since my last post.
1) I switched them from plastic cups to glass cups with about 6oz. of water. I almost knocked over the plastic cups one too many times, so I thought the glass would be safer.

2) they're not really into the tadpole bites, but love to munch on the almond leaves and java moss.

3) all five have started growing their legs. Two have knees and toes showing, one with just toes, and two have just had them pop out not long ago.

4) the most developed tad's body is very lumpy, for lack of a better word. I'm assuming that it's all part of the development.

5) all but one are showing spots

6) the transparent tad is still transparent, but starting to show some spots. All of the rest are dark almost black, but this one is still pretty clear


Toes






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Cliygh and Mia 2, Heatheranne

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## Heather

Awe  :Smile: 


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## AbranV

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