My Golden Mantella's

Hi, hope you like them picked the five up today

Hi Tony,

Very nice, they look very at home in your natural set up.

I wish you every success with them.



Ben

Nice animals, my friend keeps a group of nine in a 4 foot planted set up. these frogs are brilliant for big planted enclosures, there colours really show them off.

very nice, in the process of planning a set up for some of these, stunning frogs, good luck with them

Nice! You can never find mantellas around here.

Gorgeous animals and great setup too. Best of Luck with them. You don't see them over here as much anymore.

Alex

I think its because of collection laws. That really isn't a bad thing, but someone needs to get these guys breedin'!

There are a couple of breeders on dendroboard.com that have them for sale occasionally.

Alex

I've gotten a recent crash course introduction into the breeding of Golden Mantellas, and the rearing of tadpoles. We're currenty breeding a group of 4.2 in a 10 gallon tank. The cage is misted 5 times a day, each misting lasts approx. 15mins. The males are seen combating, and heard calling on a regular basis. The male's call is short and similar to other Mantella species, which sounds more like a cricket, rather than a frog. The females get noticeably larger and swollen with eggs prior to deposition. Egg laying sites have been in the form of small, "Gladware" disposible tupperware containers filled with spagnum moss, with half the lid cut off. The frogs do prefer a darker, secluded hide to lay the eggs. We've noticed that once we see a few males guarding a nesting site, it's almost a garuntee the female has deposited a rather large mass (50 to 60 eggs) in the container. The eggs develop rather quickly, and usually start hatching with 7 to 10 days. A little trick on rearing tadpoles... keep them dark! They are extremely sensitive to light! We couldn't figure out why the tadpoles weren't doing well in the first batch until we read about the lighting. As soon as the first batch was kept dark, they litterally took off like weeds! It's been roughly two months since the first mass was laid, the back legs are fully developed and the front leg buds seem to be forming. Because of their small size and rather quick development, a little extra attention is needed with the eggs and tadpoles, compaired to that of their distant central/south american relatives. Good luck with breeding!

Has anyone got a calling clip of the males please or where i can find one.

I found this video online of two males combating and calling back and forth.

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/yt-C7-2cK26tNY/mantella_aurantiaca_wrestling/

Hi thanks for that.

Do you mist them by hand?! Few people I know have more than an hour a day to alot to frog misting.

bobberly1 said:

Do you mist them by hand?! Few people I know have more than an hour a day to alot to frog misting.

Click to expand...

Cheap automatic misting system.

Here's my video that shows the frog room.

http://www.vimeo.com/1727143

If you listen closely you can hear the Mantellas calling.

This thread is offering quite a bit of insight. I only wish I could keep amphibians here at school. David, that video was great, where do you work?

found two lots of eggs tonight will let you all know how they get on.

Wow I thought these guys were really rare where only specialized people only know the best locations to find them? Either way they're nice!

Do they do hand waving gesture?

A little update on the Golden Mantella breeding and rearing of the tadpoles and young:

Our first group of morphs came out of the water with SLS, probably due to the delayed development (lighting issue) early on. I'm now raising a 2nd wave of froglets that are doing very well. They're are nearly 2 months out of the water now, and feeding vigirously on springtails. I've noticed the best way to feed these little frogs is to keep them on a thin layer of colored aquarium gravel (to best view the frogs) and have the water level nearly to the top of the layer gravel. This allows the frogs to perch upon the gravel and feed on the floating springtails. The tiny frogs have seemed to double in body size and weight since emerging from the water, and have taken on an overall copper color.

I'll try to get some pictures posted sometime..