O/T: How to raise tadpoles

My son wants to try raising some tadpoles in the house. The first set he got out of the pond died, perhaps from low oxygen in the water? He is starting again with another batch. Anyone ever done this? Do you have any pointers?

Thank you in advance.

Christopher

Watch the water temp. no more than the mid 60's. Too hot will kill them.

Not too sure on the oxygenation, but if you had them in a tank with a whisper type filter and let the water fall and make bubbles, will help that.

Not sure what type of frog you're dealing with when they mature, but if you provide filtered water, a place out of the water and maybe a little heat from a light, they usually do fine, not long ago I had a common green frog, I disturbed in the winter when fixing a culvert pipe, he was something else, when it came to chowing on crickets, best to have those feed on something good, fresh carrot or potato, then the frog will get good nutrition from them, heck I disturbed his winter nap, least I could do was put him up for awhile and set him free when it warmed up, they don't do much though this one would make noise if I was on the phone near him, he was aggressive when it came to claiming his turf and nailing bugs for dinner. Somehow I figured it was a good deed, have always respected the wildlife around here.

Maybe you know this, but when we add goldfish to stocktanks here, you MUST, regardless of the temp of the water, put them in a container that will gradually acclimate to the same temp as the new environment.

Why would you want tadpoles in the house, next thing you know there's frogs...and then you have to bring in the mosquitos... and then after a moonlit night, more tadpoles...jk

Do not use clorinated water, Well water or pond
water is best.
Take lettuce leaf, drop into boiling Water untill
soft, remove from boiling water let cool
and cut into small pieces[1/8 inch square]
spread onto plastic saran wrap and freeze.
Break off little pieces and feed to them.
They love it.
Good luck!
Steve.

I was involved in developmental biology research on frogs years ago. We always found the toughest thing for raising tadpoles was getting them through metamorphosis, when they grow legs and reabsorb their tails to become frogs. This is also a time when their entire digestive system reorganizes to go from the herbivore (plant-eating) diet of the tadpole to the carnivore (insect eating) diet of the frog. The process is controlled internally in the tadpoles by thyroid hormone, and is very sensitive to temperature and other environmental conditions.

Steve's advice is good- use water from the pond you found them in, and try to keep the temperature around the same as the pond will be for the time of year the tadpoles are being raised. It will help if you just let the algae grow in the tank that the tadpoles are being raised in; really clean water and clean tank sides is not actually the best thing for the tadpoles. He may find the tadpoles will grow bigger and bigger, but never make the full transition to a frog. We often had these giant tadpoles with only hind legs that just didn't make the complete transition to frog. Introducing some small insects or other invertebrates from the pond into their diet at that time can help them get through the final transition. The easiest way to collect some of them would be drag a fine net through the pond and rinse it out in a small jar of some pond water. He'll probably be amazed at just how many little creatures there are in a small volume of pond water in mid summer.