Adult male attacking young

[MrFusion]

I have a male Man Creek who started calling today and simultaneously started attacking a juvenile that is roughly 2-3 months (At most) out of the water. I've never seen this happen before with any of my Pumilio. The frogs are well fed with dusted flies in addition to the viv being well established with springtails so it's not a food issue. Also, the viv is quite larg and holds only one other probable female. I've since removed the juvenile, but have any of you had a similar experience? In my experience it seems off.

[Ed]

There are periodic reports of it on the boards. Usually the reports mention that there have been few or no prior emergences in that pairing.

[billschwinn]

It sounds as if the adult male recognizes a juvie male and is driving him from his territory. You probably should consider removing the juvie. Bill

[ChrisK]

Could you define the attacking? A lot of times I see pumilio grab each other around the waist (usually during misting/feeding), almost like an amplexus, and then just jump around like that, like nothing's wrong - were they doing that or more of a fighting/jumping on top over and over kind of deal?

[acam]

In my Almirante's I had the female chasing the babies. Its almost like there trying to smother them right? It happens, I tripped out on it but theres not much you can do. All i can say is provide a lot of leave litter and other objects for them to hide under. Once the froglets notice the adult coming they will hide. Second, don't take them out there unless there old enough you stress them out they'll probably gonna die. Mine were about 3-4 months old when they started doin it and then it went away. I was also surprised to find more tadpoles at the time so maybe its just a way of weening them off (maybe).

[Julio]

this is very common among Oophaga genus frogs.

you need to provide a lot of leaf littler cover for the froglets to hide. The males will constantly attack froglets, they see them as a threat to theri territory. So if you see it happening and see it often, pull the froglets. The male will more often then not kill the froglets if left in the parental tank.

[ESweet]

Some breeders suggest letting them rough it out and suggest that this is natural in nature. They feel that pulling the froglet early impedes its chances of survival more than issues with the parents. However, in my research in the wild I have NEVER seen adult-offspring aggression only adult-adult aggression. I think this is because the offspring have the ability to find their own territory or female availability isn't so limited. Regardless, pull the frog, just do it carefully (ie don't chase it around the tank - place a container in there, bait them and carefully and slowly remove the container and transport). In my experience with oophaga, a father who does this to one offspring will likely do this to others. As such I recommend to pull future offspring in the way I described before there is a threat.

On another note, I have noticed that the availability for cover in the tank and presence of micro-fauna tends to affect the fathers antagonizing of his offspring.

[Julio]

Erik i agree, however the confines of a glass box dont' allow enough space for the froglets to get away, i have only witnessed this behavior in "farm raised" animals not among F1s or F2s generations.

[frogface]

I have a breeding pair of El Dorados in a 20g vert, with 2 froglets in the tank and, I think, a few soon to morph out. There is another froglet that was removed from the tank a month or so ago, to make more room.

Anyway, I'd never seen any aggression in the tank until today. I saw the, very egg laden, female chasing one of the froglets around the tank. Over branches, under leaves. She was clearly after this one froglet. The other froglet was left alone.

I'm guessing that the one she was chasing is female and the one she ignores is male. Dunno. They are around 4 months old, and, still tiny.

Hmm, now that I think about it, the other day, when the male was calling, I thought I saw this froglet paying attention and maybe moving in closer to him.

So, I made a new froglet tank

Just my observations

eta: I have not witnessed aggression from the male.

[MrFusion]

Whoops! I forgot to respond to this thread. My adult male was very definitely pouncing on top of the juvenile. I later found that eggs had been deposited in the vivarium. Unfortunately, the tads weren't transported, but this was their first clutch. At any rate, I placed the juvenile back in the vivarium and haven't witnessed any aggression since. However, the male has started calling again so we'll see what happens.