Red Vittatus?

[Rusty_Shackleford]

Yes I'd like to know the same thing. Is it to create a demand for the red frogs? Is it to line breed them?


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[sharpn2]

Originally Posted by vugger#1

I got of them from Zach Brinks in a trade. They are 5 months old now and they all have red stripes at this point. That could change over time.

Mine did. I bought twenty vittatus froglets, most of which had the red stripes. A month or so later, only the youngest of the lot still has it. The rest are copper now. I've heard adding paprika to the supplements keeps them red, but I've never tested it myself.

[Gamble]

The only ones that need seperated is the wide & narrow bands.

The coloration has no bearing considering u could have two copper colored parents who produce red striped offspring.

[EricM]

I have posted this info in other threads but probably not in the species section. I have two differant populations of vittatus. One is the classic green and orange vittatus that has been in the US hobby for many decades. The other group was brought in from Europe in the late 90s, these have narrow red stripes with the legs being more blue than the mint green of the orange striped ones. Both groups breed true with the same exact supplements, conditions etc.

first photo is old line orange and green
second and third are the narrow red and blue euro line

I am sure that these two pops have been mixed along the way, which only adds to the confusion of frog identity, as well as variability within each group.

I am not sure if my old orange group is considered "wide band" or not.

thanks
Eric

[stemcellular]

Those look great, Eric. My group is from Aaron H. and breeds true but looks a bit different:

[cbreon]

Another somewhat similar frog is Hyloxalus azureiventris, both of these frogs are usually pretty easy find and very underappreciated in my opinion, here is a link with some pics:

www.DendroBase.de

[skylsdale]

I helped write the vittatus TMP and the reason we recommended maintaining two separate populations is because they were introduced into the hobby from two different origins (even if one of those origins was Europe) without any solid information about whether or not they were from the same population (if you check the IUCN website, there is a possibility there are two populations). Also, it's possible that clinal variation is a possibility as some frogs seem to have a speckled pattern between the dorsal stripes. Whether this is variation within the population, clinal variation or different populations, we have been unable to determine for sure.

Using colors to differentiate the populations is misleading (as has been said) because I have seen different color/hues of striping within the same line simply because of supplementation and diet. I believe this was used in at least the first draft of the DB care sheet--whether or not they are still listed that way, I'm not sure. This is why we went with the 'wide-banded' and 'narrow-banded' labels and, although they are not the best descriptors...they are better than using coloration.

As EricM said above, I wonder how much these have actually already been mixed in the past. I have the wide-banded line that I know have not been mixed with any other frogs, but am not sure how similar/different they are than the narrow-banded frogs. It's quite possible they are from the same population or were collected in the same general area, but when considering genetics and captive population management, we could only work with absolute information and details...hence the reason in the TMP we had to recommend that they be managed separately.