D. azureus Strange death

After 3 months in a 10 gal vertical tank together, I came home to find one of my two juvenal D. azureus one it’s back, the other sitting on top. I removed the one that was on it’s back into a sick container, misted it and placed some Ffs within the container. After several minutes, I checked back and the FF were crawling all over it’s body, still sitting up right. I knew this was bad. About 10 minutes later, it looked like it had tried to jump, but didn’t make it off the ground, just spread out. I had to bury it the next day.

The remaining azureus has now become lethargic and just sits motionless. I feed everyday, but it just sits still. Only when I hand mist her does it move, like to get away from the water. I am very worried. Before the first one died, They both were very active, moving about the tank every time I watched them, but it’s behavior has slowly been going down hill since them, about two weeks ago.

The only things I can come up with is after a few weeks of setting up the tank, some orange mushrooms started to grow. This didn’t seem to effect either of the frogs. They would come and go. About a week before I found the first one, a new type of mushroom began to grow. This one was more cream. A few days later, several began to grow, and the cycle has continued. The other possibility is the room I am keeping they in gets hotter than the rest of the house, but not by much that would effect the frogs. The tank reaches @ 78 day, 70 night. Humidity stays @ 80-90 percent.

Sorry for such a long post, but I fell like I at my wits end. Any suggestions???? Could my frog be suffering loneliness? Or is this an illness?

[felicitedanes]

Sorry to hear about your azureus...how's the second one doing? I think a reasonable first step would be to have a fecal looked at to see if they've got any parasites. I had a young azureus that was very lethargic and I took a fecal to the vet school and sent one off to Dr. Frye and it turned out she had a massive hookworm infestation. She's perked up and gained a lot of weight since treatment. Even if the frogs had a sub-clinical infection before, it could have been amplified over time as they shed eggs into their small environment and are continually re-exposed. If that doesn't turn up anything, I guess your next step would be to talk to a herp vet.
I don't think it would be anything to do with the mushrooms, as people seem to have mushrooms spontaneously popping up in their vivs all the time with no apparent ill effects. And your temp/humidity are about the same as my azureus are kept at, and they're fine with it.
Hope you can figure something out and the other frog makes it.
Felicite

[Ed]

What supplements were you using and how often?

Ed

Thank you for your suggestions. I moved the remaining azureus to a new sick tank, but it lost the fight a day after I moved it. I don't know of any herp vets in my area, but I think now is a great time to find one.
I found a pic of the same type of mushroom I thought was the problem at the bottom of the following thread: http://dendroboard.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=9650.
Now I am just confused. I don't know what to do with the 10g vertical tank I had them in: Clean it out and start again or trash it, fearing something in the tank I am not thinking of and play it safe.

Ed, the supplements consisted of Rep-Cal calcium dusted FF once a week.

Thank you all once again.

[Ed]

Hi,
I have to ask for a little clarification here. The company that makes Rep-Cal and Herptivite also makes a straight calcium supplement. So were you useing the straight Calcium carbonate or the calcium carbonate/D3 supplement?

I have some thoughts here, but they will be pure speculation unless the frog is necropsied.

Ed

It's Rep-Cal calcium carbonate/D3 supplement. My frogs share it with my wife's bearded dragon.
What thoughts do you have? I would be intrested in any ideas so this won't happen again.

[Ed]

Okay,
One of the possible (and I stress the phrase possible) causes is that the frogs had a vitamin A deficiency (ffs are deficient in vitamin A) and as a result developed "short tongue syndrome". This would prevent the frogs from feeding creating a situation where they could then develop a disruption in the calcium metabolism resulting in the inability to move and feed (in anurans the tongue bones are often deformed by "mbd" preventing feeding).

There are other possible deficiencies that could have caused the same issues as the diet is deficient in a number of required trace nutrients that are not being supplied by the ffs or the supplement.

Rep-cal by itself while a good product does not supply all of the trace nutrients required by the frogs. This is why it is supposed to be mixed as needed with the herptivite. You won't see this with the bearded dragon if you are feeding it greens as part of its diet (and if you aren't you should) or it is getting another extraneous source of vitamin A.

Just some thoughts,

Ed

[Rain_Frog]

personally, i used Sandfire Dragonranch Treefrog Dust on all my juvenile tinc, tricolor, and mantella betsileo and they grew very large and fat quick.

I didn't start using Repcal mostly until they became adults. I fed out Treefrog dust on every feeding while young, then slowly weaning them off, but I think I may switch back to Treefrog dust because I personally think it provides a wider range, but it is more diluted.

[Ed]

Rep-cal is made to contain less of the other supplements as it is supposed to be mixed with Herptovite as neccessary at the time of feeding. This eliminates a lot of the self catalyzed oxidation of the fat soluable vitamins that occurs in "complete" supplements. More "diluted" is not necessarily better as this can cause deficiencies of other required nutrients resulting in a variety of problems.
Rep-Cal was not ment to be used as a stand alone supplement in the manner a lot of hobbyists use the product.

Ed