Feeding Dart Frogs On Vacation - Leaving Your Vivarium

Leaving Your Vivariums While Away

If you’re like me you never want to be too far from your frogs and vivariums, but of course everyone needs to leave from time to time. Even if you have one vivarium, leaving for a couple days to a couple weeks is always a stressful event. Luckily there are ways to prepare for a vacation without needing someone to watch and feed your poison dart frogs, although having one is always best. I have come up with a pretty reliable vacation strategy and have left my frogs alone for almost 2 weeks without worries or needing someone to stop by.

The two most important things to consider when leaving your frogs for extended periods of time is humidity and food. Both can be taken care of by a reliable pet sitter or fellow frogger if you have one close to you! Otherwise keep reading to see some strategies to employ before hopping away to your vacation.

NOTE: There is always some risk when leaving your animals alone without someone to stop by and make sure everything is okay. Your mister could stop working or your power can go out, so try this at your own risk! I definitely recommend having someone in the area who can stop by if possible.

Managing Humidity in Your Dart Frog Vivarium

Truthfully, if you are to leave for any more than a few days an automatic mister like a mist-king system is a must. Otherwise finding a reliable pet sitter who can mist or feed your frogs may be your only option. If you do hand mist it is possible to leave your frogs for a few days, just mist heavily, lower your lights a bit, and cover the majority of the top vents on your vivarium.

It is important to do a trial run in the weeks leading up to your vacation to see how long you can leave your vivarium(s) before you need to top off your automatic mister or before your vivarium dries out. I mark days on my calendar when I fill my mist king reservoir so I’m aware of how long it takes to empty (~12 days on a 5 gallon bucket). If you have to leave for longer this is easily mitigated by getting a larger reservoir.

Feeding Your Dart Frogs While Away

Because our frogs live in thriving ecosystems teaming with microfauna you can usually go a few days without feeding, this is especially true if your frogs are usually well fed. I always try to prepare my dart frogs before going on vacation by feeding heavily 2 weeks before I have to leave. I usually feed 3-4 times a week but leading up to a vacation I feed more frequently but smaller amounts. Additionally, I make extra fruit fly cultures so when I come back I have some ready to go.

The week leading up to leaving I go through all my vivariums and seed each one with spring tails and extra isopods. Your vivarium may hold a stable population of microfauna, but a group of hungry frogs can quickly seek and destroy your springtails and isopods. I find it is always better to err on the side of caution and overstock your vivarium with extra microfauna.

Before setting off for my vacation I like to put in some older cultures and poke a couple holes in the lid to allow fruit flies to escape. This method of slow feeding works great especially if the culture still has some life and larvae left in it. In situations where I have to leave for a longer period of time I may even leave a booming culture there although this may be overkill.

Between the heavy feeding, increased microfauna, and slow-feeding fruit fly cultures in each vivarium you usually have quite a few days where you do not have to worry about your vivarium. Last time I had to take an extended vacation I employed these tactics and after 2 weeks I still had fruit flies emerging from the culture with all of my frogs looking healthy.

Summary

It is important to note that these techniques may not work for you or if your frogs are on the skinnier side. Be sure to inspect your frogs before leaving to determine if they will be okay! If you have younger frogs or some that may need some extra care you could add a clay springtail culture to the vivarium as well. This would allow the frogs to get some extra calcium supplementation while also having a large supply of springtails.

If you have someone who can check in on your frogs and top off your mister, but are not too keen on pouring out some flies into your vivarium you could always prepare some fruit fly cultures with less media that they can use to leave in your vivariums. This is a more reliable way of feeding your frogs and ensuring they can get supplementation.