Fringed leaf frog

FRINGED LEAF FROG

Cruziohyla Craspedopus

Look who is here! BlackxReptiles has some amazing and rare Fringed Leaf Frogs that are South America locality and perfect exotic friends. They are just stunning pets and will be doing great in your wild nature like environment.

One of the rarest and most charismatic amphibians in the world, the Fringed Leaf Frog (Cruziohyla craspedopus) is a treasure to take care of.

As a way of start, I advise you to read carefully the care sheet presented below.

INTRODUCTION

The fringed leaf frog or fringed tree frog, scientifically called Cruziohyla craspedopus — is a species of frog in the family Phyllomedusidae, alternatively treated as the subfamily Phyllomedusinae of the family Hylidae. The genus Cruziohyla has only two species: C. calcarifer and C. craspedopus. They are truly one of the most impressive tree frogs in tropical America because of their unusual internal and external features.

WILD HABITAT

Cruziohyla craspedopus is a high-canopy frog of primary tropical lowland rainforest. They live at a height of 50–600 m above sea level. This fantastic frog is rarely seen by humans as it totally nocturnal specie that lives in the high canopies of tropical rainforests in Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Honduras, and Peru. It only descends to lower branches to breed in small water pools in trees or on the ground. According to the IUCN, they are at least concern. However its population is tend to decline due to loss of habitat from human activities such as agriculture. It occurs in several protected areas such as national parks and reservations.

MAIN FEATURES

You may recognize these fantastic creatures from the first sight because of their unique morphology and coloring pattern.  The dorsum has uniform dark green dorsal background coloration interspersed with irregular-shaped large pale blue-grey lichenose blotches. The flanks and the inside of the limbs are orange-yellow, more or less tigered with black, the fingers are orange and the eyes are gray with a yellow periphery. Youngster have the same characteristics but with a uniform gray / brown coloring on the back and upper side of the limbs. The coloring will change to green with growth.

Talking about the anatomy, the head is slightly wider than it is long. The fingers and toes are webbed. Spurs at the tip of the shins and elbows are present. Adult males length range from 5 to 7 cm (2.1–2.6 in) and adult females from 7-9 (2.7–3.0 in. The sex of the frog you can tell by looking at their snout. The female individuals often have the black dot, while male doesn´t.

THE TERRARIUM SETUP

When looking for a perfect terrarium for your froggy friends, there are a few things that are really vital in order to organize a perfect tropical-like house:

• Depending on the amount of the habitant, choose the comfortable, broad enough terrarium. For example, if you have the group of three (one female and two males) the size should be at least 90x45x90 cm.
• For the soil you may use drained clay balls, layer of a white peat and mosquito net.
• Properly arranged water point, spraying always on time.

Nozzles connected to a diaphragm pump on timer ensure automatic spraying, which is important for the species depending on the season.

Decoration is another important thing. Usually it should include:

• medium size vertical and horizontal branches, lianas;
• pieces of bark;
• live plants, sturdy horizontally placed leaves (the large Philodendron, Calathea.)

Pay attention to the plant as it is essential for the creation of comfortable environment. It is good to use a large Philodendron plant (its leaves are about 25 cm) but other plants works as well. Let it occupies the entire space of the terrarium, as it provides positive effect. Better to use a plant with relatively strong and rigid leaves because not only young but adults as well always sleep on the top of the leaves. So the leaves should be strong enough to support the weight of one or more frogs and remain more or less in horizontal position.

As for the heating and lightning, it is advisable to use:

• At least two neon lights. One may be 12% of UVB, and the other 2% of UVB. These will ensure the ambient lighting plus make the terrarium appearance view relatively wider.
• A comfortable temperature is 71-75°F. For the night, the whole terrarium temperature descends between 71-75 ° F.

Keep in mind, temperature fluctuates several degrees depending on season. It’s good idea to use thermo-controlled ceramic bulb. Just place it above the terrarium, it´ll allows to maintain the temperature between 75 and 84°F.

Humidity in the terrarium should be around 70-80%. However, it is necessary to reproduce the changing of the dry and wet seasons. We will talk about it more precise in a breeding section.

FEEDING

This species is insectivorous, means they can be feed with insects, worm, and other invertebrates. Try to enrich their ration from time to time as it helps to maintain a good health. That´s what I usually advice to give your stunning fridged leaf frog:

• You may use the crickets of two kinds (the domestic cricket (Acheta domestica) and the steppe cricket (Gryllus assimilis)) as well middle sized locusts and moths (Galleria mellonella).
• Make sure there is some mineral supplements with the every other feeding (calcium and vitamins).
• The supplements is done on 4 distributions.

For the supplement, the crickets should be pre-fed with carrot as it allows insects to hydrate and get rich in vitamins and carotene, necessary for your stunning pet.

The prey is distributed twice a week, except the dry season. The food should be enriched with supplements( for example, from the Repashy brand you may choose “Supervite”,”Supercal LoD” and “Vitamin A plus”.) The alternation of the supplements is done on 4 distributions: one with the crickets added Supervite, one with a mixture of vitamin A and calcium, one without supplement and the last one with just calcium. Then, resume the cycle from the beginning.

Depending on animal behavior, choose the appropriate way to release the prey. Insects are released into the terrarium, but individuals are regularly fed with the forceps.

For the collected prey, make sure they came from the areas free from pesticides and herbicides!

BREEDING

If you planning the captive breeding of the species, it’s essential to replicate the alternation of natural seasons. Usually, the cycle consists of two periods: a dry period and a wet period. Now, let’s consider the main details about each season.

Dry period:

Dry period lasts about 6 months. During this period make sure to maintain the progressive reduce of spraying. Especially, at the beginning of the first month, the sprays should occur twice a day, one in the morning just before lighting and the second in the evening just after it was extinguished. Each spray lasts one minute. Later on as season continues, the morning spray disappears gradually, the spraying of the evening continues but with the reduced duration. At the beginning of the third month, keep only a very slight spraying in the evening that can be done only manually two or three times during the week until the end of the dry period. Throughout this stage, the substrate remains moist and a water source is permanently available. You can keep that up for weeks or months.  When you think the time is right, put the male in the chamber and start increasing the humidity. You should wait till the male has its nuptial pads appeared. That is the time when you might add you females.

The frogs are less active during these months, but they continue to eat normally (depends on individuals), and as a rule do not lose weight. During the last month of the dry season, it is vital to increase the feeding for the females so that she receives good resources for the ovarian mass. Prey distribution occurs four times a week.

Wet period:

There are only two main stages in this period: the rain chamber, and the return in terrarium with a constant spraying.

As soon as the dry period is finished, happy and well-fed frogs ready for the reproducing period. With the beginning of rain season, start to increase sprays in the terrarium gradually (spray for about 30 seconds every two hours). One the same evening, you’ll already have opportunity to enjoy the romantic song from the males. During wet period, continue to feed four times a week.

It is vital to properly install the raining system for your froggy friends (use the specially arranged tubes for the terrarium.) Some keepers prove that just the normal rain drop system in the terrarium is better than a pump, but let´s us consider both. During the active raining season, the rain system is switched on all the time. The female should be put inside only is after about one week since the resumption of spraying. In the course of the second night, the female emitted sounds which proved to be as audible as the singing of the males. At third night comes upon, the female and male should be putted together. The next morning, before switch on the lights, you may find the couple exploring each other in the mating position. Shortly before laying, the female descends to the water level to absorb water through the cloaca.

The eggs are laid a few centimeters above the water. They glue their eggs vertically to the roots and branches of plants, so you should provide leaves and roots where they’ll be able to do this. In the Amazon region you have small pools and water filled tree holes during large parts of the year, so this species isn’t bound to a particular dry season, although cycling them helps in the long run for their health and longevity.

Each spawning took place early in the morning shortly after the lighting was switched on. After the laying is done, the couple should return in the usual terrarium. Maintain the rhythm of a spray (thirty seconds every four hours) until the beginning of the next dry season.

EGGS AND NEWBORN TADPOLES

The eggs have the blurry blue color, with the embryonic brown part. The gangue is thick and served as the support. The diameter of the egg is five millimeters after twenty-four hours (without the gangue). If the eggs fall down inside the water for some reasons, unfortunately, are not viable. For that reason, it is good to put an egg crate on the bottom.

After nine day period, the first egg-laying are usually ready to be released. For the second laying, it may took between seven to nine days. Tadpoles are stimulated by manual spraying. It incites them to stir in the egg and cause it to break. After that, all the tadpoles should be replaced with the special dip net into the small aquarium for the first few days.

Tadpoles Aquarium Setup

• From the beginning the tadpoles can be put in aquarium of 50x35x25 cm, with fifteen centimeters of spring water.
• It is also good to have the filtration ensured by a small external filter equipped with an activated carbon filter and a cascade water outlet which allows to oxygenate the water.
• Include the Catappa leaf floats at the bottom of the water because it’s has antifungal and bactericidal properties.
• The temperature of the water should rise up to 78 ° F during day time , and go down to 75 ° F at night. Use an immersion heater of 50W
• The lighting is done by a small LED ramp and recreates a photoperiod of 12 hours per day.

From the froglet stage, the tadpoles / frogs are transferred into a tilted plastic box, with water on the bottom that has slopes. The slope allows having 3 centimeters of water on one side and no water at all of the other, to facilitate the exit to the water. Watch out for the frogs to have a safe exit in order to protect the young from the drowning. After about 48 hours after the discharge of water, the little Cruziohyla is transferred to another box. It should be a larger one, with a small watering point, that contains wet sphagnum as substrate and several cuttings of Monstera deliciosa plant.

Keep the young frogs in separate terrariums. The young should be treated in the terrariums using the same parameters as for the adults, only the size for home differs. They are fed with appropriate size crickets three times a week. Just follow the same advices as for the adults.

Tadpoles feeding

Be ready because the tadpoles have a very good appetite! Feed your babies 3 or 4 times a day. You may feed them with variety of rich in necessary vitamins food: starting from Novo Malawi (JBL), Spirulina tabs (Sera), Spirulina premium (JBL), Tetra Wafer mix (Tetra), ending with small crickets and Catappa leaf.

BEHAVIOURAL ISSUES:

The behavior has similar peculiarities of the most tree frogs genus. It is a strictly nocturnal species, that means fully relaxed hardly movable during the daytime specie, but active as soon as night comes upon. With the appearance of light, the individuals are placed on top of a large, strong leaf, tighten their limbs along their bodies and will not move during the day (except for the rainy season, where they may be a little more active during the day).

You may find them going back on the same leaves several days in a row. In the rainy season, males are generally more active as they are in the competition with the other males during the reproduction period.

They never descend to the ground, except in the case of rehydration in the water point (or before laying)or prey on the ground, but they rise again immediately. Their constitution allows them to move perfectly on all types of forest supports: more or less fine branches, creepers, leaves, and panes in terrarium. Just as for the family of Phyllomedusinae, the Cruziohyla moves by walking more or less slowly over the plant leaves.

SUMMARY

To sum up, the Fringed leaf frog is one of the rarest and most charismatic amphibians in the world, which makes it so desirable for the exotic keeper. Little is known about this species in the wild due to their highly seclusive nature, but they are doing great in captivity as soon as all the requirements and arrangements are strictly followed by the owner.

Note: the care sheet presents the general information on the specie. It is aimed to help you with the most common questions and solutions. In cases of displaying serious symptoms or strange behavior please contact the professional assistance.