Tank Mates? Tank Set Up?

[RedPoppy]

I am very new to Fire Belly Toads, so new we haven't even bought any yet. We are still doing research and putting together a home for them. My question was if I put a filter in the tank and divide half of the tank so they have water and land can I put fish in with them? Or even a Green Anole lizard? We have a several spare 20-40 gallon tanks that we are debating what size to use. Though we were thinking no more than 3 or 4 toads. Any advice on tank set up would be great too, thank you.

[GrifTheGreat]

I am very new to Fire Belly Toads, so new we haven't even bought any yet. We are still doing research and putting together a home for them. My question was if I put a filter in the tank and divide half of the tank so they have water and land can I put fish in with them? Or even a Green Anole lizard? We have a several spare 20-40 gallon tanks that we are debating what size to use. Though we were thinking no more than 3 or 4 toads. Any advice on tank set up would be great too, thank you.

No you don't want to house reptiles with amphibians and Fire Bellies are toxic so housing anything other than other Fire bellies together is out of the question. Even a fish would die from the frogs toxins getting into the water. Water may also foul up faster with a fish living in the water source and if the fish has any parasites or diseases they will pass to the frogs.

[Hoppity100]

FB's are fun, do you know how large your tank will be? I would keep frogs with frogs. When I found mine at petsmart they had frogs in with crabs. Well, frogs can hop but crabs can pinch. I would not keep them together. I have a 10 gal aquarium with a submersible heater (water 76 degrees), driftwood, treehouse, pebbles for land with round big flat lid with eco earth fiber in it, plus large smooth rocks, live and fake plants, terra cotta clay pot for hiding. I have them in some humidity. I read that frogs are ok without a heater then later found better source that said they like it warm and somewhat humid. By looking at them they look like a variety that prefers warmth. I feed mine several kinds of worms and crickets. I would like 2 more FB's and a total of 4. Oh, be sure you have a screened lid. Another tip: have a tall tank so its less likely they can escape. Mine don't even try! They must like their home, especially without crabs. Hope this helps.

[FrogFriend]

Housing other things with your FBT seems to be the great debate. I wondered the exact same question and with all the research that I did I saw it as 50/50. Some said it was ok, some said it was not ok. I would definitely agree that a green anole would be a BAD addition. Also, remember that FBTs will eat just about anything that can fit in their mouths! When I first got mine they came with gravel (I bought them off of someone). I hated it! When I fed them I would see that they would accidentally get a mouth full of gravel either with their cricket or if they missed. Halft the time when I fed them I was standing by to pull chunks of gravel out of their mouths and sometimes I wouldn't get to it in time. Nothing scarier than waiting for your FBT to pass a large jagged chunk of blue gravel! I don't know what the people were thinking! When I noticed the problem I immediately changed what was at the bottom of their tank. I went with smooth pebble/rocks that are far too large for any kind of accidental swallowing and over time my tank developed into what they have now which their feet never really touch the bottom of their tank. I mention this because if you DO decide to go the route of getting fish to add in, you want to make sure that they are too big for your toads to eat. Also, you want to get something that is VERY subdued, docile, non-agressive. Their skin is delicate and you don't need something nipping at them because they are in the fishes "territory". Next, if you decide you want fish too than you need a LARGE tank, like your 40g. There needs to be enough space between the toad world and the fish world, I have seen some great ideas when I did my searches. You need a good filtration system, something constantly putting out fresh water and cleaning up the toxins. You want to make sure that you keep the tank clean regularly so that you don't hurt the fish and so that the fish waste doesn't hurt the toads. AND you want to make sure that the tank, water and conditions are hospitable for the fish! I personally do have other living things in with my toads. There is a turtle dock with moss and plants for the toads to perch on. I do have a filter waterfall that they get up on the ridges and up on the top. I have some large rocks that poke barely out of the water for the toads to perch on as well. Underneath I have two Mystery Snails and one Emerald catfish. They do a great job keeping my algae levels down in the tank and both are ambivalent to the toads. I have an air pump going in to the water for the catfish and snails and I drop a algae wafer or two in every few days to ensure that they are getting enough food. I skim the tank every few days to get old food debris out and I change the filters about every 3 weeks instead of 4 weeks since I do have other things. But FBTs can get themselves sick from their toxins if their tanks aren't maintained, so I am on top of that! The toads leave them alone, they leave the toads alone and every now and again the mystery snails make a great stepping stool for the toads to get up somewhere or to balance themselves when they are floating. I have had them all living together for quite some time. In fact one of my snails is laying clutches in the toad tank and they are growing quite well! As a side note- I do not keep the clutches up. We have enough snails that we don't need anymore.

[Hoppity100]

Yeah, housing frogs with crabs is done by the store because they don't want another tank to maintain! This is easier on them. They also don't care when they house red tailed and bala sharks together in a tiny little aquarium and the balas constantly nip the red tails. But they keep their feeder goldfish in a huge tank. I found this in our store, pointed out balas should be in large tank and feeder fish should be in smaller tanks. Then red tails could then relax and be left alone. And does the store care? No. But, since FB's have a toxin thing going, I don't handle mine because of their sensitive skin. I am not worried about my skin, but theirs. The 4 I have are great together and I believe happier. I hear chirping calls every night and enjoy hearing the happiness. I am so happy you removed gravel! I have pebbles in my tank for that reason and feed frogs on top of large smooth rock or put a worm on top of a live plant on top of small flat plastic lid. I also removed any sand from my tank as it is horrible to clean but I don't want mine ingesting that either. Mine don't mind eating at water surface or from rock or plant surface. I thought about putting fish in my tank but if frog ate one and it was sick, I would not want to risk that combination. I wonder how long fish could really live in frog tank anyway from toxins or frog trying to eat them. If I knew fish were not ill and could find tiny fish, I'd add them for a tasty treat. I don't have algae and clean my tank once a week. Oh, it may be because of the underwater heater or air allowed in tank. Anyway, hope this helps.

Oh, just thought of something: snails can live in FB water? Hey, if this is the case, I'm getting a snail! Thank you for writing about your pets. I thought a snail might not do well in frog water. How long have you kept snails in your tank? Just curious. Thanks

[FrogFriend]

I had a HUGE algae problem for awhile. I am not sure why it was so crazy! Now it's under control between my snails and Emerald catfish. I was told at first to use real plants in the tank and it would cut down the algae. It didn't. I was cleaning it ALL the time which I didn't want to do because the constant cleaning isn't good with how sensitive they are. I don't use products when cleaning my tank because it can cause problems with the toads. I do a thorough cleaning every few months where I remove the toads and everything else and clean each thing individually and clean the tank with my own natural cleaner that I make and throughly rinse the tank and replace things. This gives me the opportunity to get the calcium deposits off the side of the tank so I can enjoy watching my toads. This algae problem is what got me to start doing research on adding other things to my tank. I heard others saying that they have other living aquatics in their tank and said basically what I mentioned regarding size of tank, types of fish and emphasis on extra cleaning. It takes more work to have fish/snails, etc because you have to do more cleaning. We had a Golden Mystery snail in one of our fish tanks and then one day she started to lay egg clutches. We decided to keep the clutches and see if we would get snails. Oh did we ever! Our original snail ended up dying not long after the snails began hatching and we started seeing tiny snails crawling on the sides of tank. Of all of the snails that we saw only 10 babies survived. I had read in one of the reports that you can have snails in with the FBTs. Nobody stated how long they had their snails or fish with their toads but I decided to give it a try. I grabbed one of the snails and put him in with my FBTs and crossed my fingers. My snail did really good, so I added another snail and kept my eye on them to make sure that they were doing ok. I checked on their shells to make sure the toxins did not affect their integrity and they were still good. The algae level was still crazy though, so I got an Emerald catfish to help out which is also when I added the air stone. The Emerald is doing great, the snails are doing great and it's been 4 months. As I mentioned earlier the snails are doing so good that they are mating and laying clutches! LOL!! But as I mentioned, I keep a VERY clean tank. The snails and catfish ignore the FBTs and the FBTs ignore the snails and catfish (the catfish is too big for the snails to even consider eating!). Now, I can't speak of any other type of snail or fish, this is just my experience with these kinds.

Oh, and as for the petstores having fish in inappropriate sized tanks with mates that may not be the best, you have to remember. Their number one responsibility is to make money! This is why when you go into PetSmart or some place like that they will load you up with all kinds of things, even if you have something they will tell you something else is better. You always want to do your research before buying or adding something! If you buy an addition then you want to keep them in quarantine for awhile to ensure that they are healthy before adding them to your population. Also, I do have a bala shark with a red tail shark. They have been together since they were frys so they aren't bad with each other. The bala does not nip at him nor he to the bala, but they do chase eachother around the tank. I am very cautious in ensuring that nobody gets hurt! When I got these guys the person who I got them from had a bala shark, red tail shark and African Electric Yellow Cichlid together in a 10 gallon tank. This is VERY inappropriate! I am sure it was fine originally when they were all babies but as they got older the cichlid began nipping at everyone. He was removed from the tank and put in another tank and now everyone is happy! Oh, and as soon as I got them home the bala and red tail were switched to my 30 gallon and just recently in my 55g. Eventually the balas will be too big for the 55g and I will have to come up with something else, which I may donate them at that time. PetSmart states that they need a 44g tank, but all my reading says that because they get to 14 inches they need an 80g p/bala.

[Hoppity100]

Wow, you're busy like me! I clean my frogs every week and I don't have algae because my real plants are several strands in the water. Other plants are fake and soft, above water surface but they can crawl over them or hide. I added a mystery snail to my fish tank a month ago and he is fine, fish don't bother him. I did not put a snail in frog tank because there is not enough water as my fish tank. I'd like an apple snail but no one sells them. Yeah, snails multiply fast. I would add a few small fish to frog tank but I haven't because I don't want to risk giving them a sick fish if they decide to have it for dinner. I'm alternating worms and crickets so they don't get bored. One frog out of four came to store quite skinny. I have given him extra worms.

With the pet store, like you said, they want to make money. The tank I saw with balas and red tails had to be less than 10 gallons and it was way overstocked. I told them what I saw the fish doing and they just had no answer. Even though balas were small, the two should not be housed together. The red tails were being bullied and it really bothered me! How can they work there and not care? And why are feeder fish in huge tank? They could be divided up into smaller tanks like the fan tails are. Goldfish don't bully other fish! This is so stupid of a store to act like they either don't care or don't want to admit something is wrong. But I research before shopping and know stores can give wrong advice. This is the same store that would not give hamsters a wheel and gave me a handful of excuses why. Each excuse got worse and worse. I emailed store and never heard anything about my complaints.

You must have alot of room to have a 55 gal tank. I have 2 10 gal tanks and carry them to kitchen to clean after removing as much water as I can. The gravel vac I bought does not work. I have no choice but to carry. The frogs are fun and I love cleaning their tank and putting it back together. If you have any more info to share about tanks, let me know. I am so glad you wrote!

[FrogFriend]

I got my mystery snails from PetSmart. From my understanding, mystery snails and apple snails are the same thing, at least they are in the same family. As for the amount of water, my FBT tank has about 5 inches of water in it. It has to have a lot of water in order for it to work properly. As for people working in the the pet stores, some are just there for the paycheck, some of them are interested in fish, etc but they just don't know much and they picked up this job hoping to learn, but just not getting taught. That happens too. My 55g is for fish. My FBT for the moment are in a 10g. I use the gravel vacuum to clean out the water but when I do a thorough clean I take it into the kitchen to clean out. But I remove all the extra stuff and take it to the kitchen to clean up first so that the tank is not so heavy. There are so many pictures on Google search of tank set ups. I would say check it out! I got some good ideas from there!

[Hoppity100]

That's how I clean my tank, I take everything out then carry it to the kitchen. Apple snails are bigger and shell I think is a different color. Our stores sell either black or yellow shell snails mostly the same size (no larger than a 25 cent piece) and the snails are in the same family. My frog tank has about 3.5 inches of water. I bought 2 different gravel vacs and they don't work well at all. I tried to get them started by getting water into tubing first and ended up with a mouth full of water! Moving up and down quickly did not work either. Thanks for telling me about tank set ups on google, my tank is as natural as I could make it. I wish someone here could show me how to post pics. I'd like to post mine with close ups from different views.

I originally got red claw crabs from petsmart and they died when I transferred them from fish tank to their own tank. I did the salt thing for their water and what happened is they became territorial in spite of having many hiding places and had one big fight overnight. The last crab I guess wanted to be alone. He was for quite a while then died. Petsmart had crabs and frogs together and I wonder what went on in their tank overnight between them. I got the feeling frogs did not like living with crabs. Do you think they belonged together in the store?