In our article we want to talk about your possible pet. Meet this common spadefoot. Recently, completely exotic pets have come into fashion, pushing traditional cats and dogs into the background.
Who is the spadefoot?
Common spadefoot (pelobates fuscus) is a frog, a member of the whole family of spadefoot. By the way, this is a small amphibious creature, up to eight centimeters long. Usually the frog is light gray or yellow-brown.
But the common spadefoot got its interesting name due to the fact that its skin sometimes emits a garlic smell. The glands of an amphibian secrete mucus with such an unpleasant odor in case of danger.
Common spadefoot: description
If you look at the spadefoot, it looks like the most common toad, only her skin is very smooth. The frog has a stocky body, a large head, but the hind legs are quite short. Her eyes are large and bulging, and there are teeth. Light stretches along the backstripe.
Common spadefoot: habitat
The spadefoot is an unusual creature. It is found in places where there is soft soil. And this is due to the fact that she loves to dig in the ground. That is why such frogs are often found in the fields, but only in damp and at night. They burrow into the soil with the help of their hind legs, which are armed with a spade-shaped tubercle. The frog spends more time underground at a depth of fifteen centimeters. Moreover, the spadefoot digs the ground with amazing speed and quickly goes vertically down. During the day, they sit in minks, and go out at night in search of food, but they can only hunt when the air is humid enough, if it is dry, they will not even leave their shelter, no matter how much they want to eat. Adults hibernate from September to April in the burrows of rodents, swallows, moles, in pits under stumps.
Common spadefoot lives in broad-leaved and mixed forests, meadows, gardens, swamps and lakes.
You can meet a frog only at dusk, at night or in the morning, and even then, only when the air humidity is sufficient for it. It is for this reason that the spadefoot is considered quite a rare species.
Reproduction of spadefoot
The frog lives in water bodies only during breeding, which is about twenty-five days. The spawning process itself takes place in water. The female is able to lay up to 1800 eggs. It should be noted that among all representatives of amphibians,spadefoot is perhaps the longest hibernation period, which is two hundred days.
The frog spends the entire mating season near a pond. The wetter and rainier the summer, the longer the breeding season will last. Females lay their clutches, similar to threads, directly on plants in ponds.
Then the tadpoles develop for about a hundred days. Very small tadpoles are orange in color, later they become golden and brownish. To feed themselves, they take a vertical position and collect the necessary food from the water surface with their mouths. Their diet is plant foods. In shallow water, they prefer not to swim. The tadpoles are large enough to fit in the palm of your hand.
As soon as they have forelimbs, they instantly leave the pond and go to land, burrow underground and wait for the moment when their tail falls off. The process of development of tadpoles can last from three to five months. Puberty of amphibians occurs at the age of three years.
Amphibian food
The common spadefoot is only nocturnal and at the same time feels great on land. In the summer, she can make whole trips, leaving six hundred meters from the water. During the day, amphibians rest, and at night they come out to hunt. They feed on insects, worms, snails.
After a night feeding, the common spadefoot (photos are given in the article) digs a hole for itselfwith its hind legs and back plunges into the ground, while closing its eyes and nostrils. It only takes a few minutes for her to fully burrow.
Frog self-defense
To protect against enemies, the frog uses the smell of garlic. It stands out at the slightest danger and is able to discourage the desire to attack. If, however, the spadefoot has not managed to hide in time, then it begins to croak loudly, swells up and rises on its paws. In such a simple way, she tries to increase her size and thereby scare the enemy. Both females and males can croak, but they do not have resonators, and therefore they can only be heard near the water. In the wild, an amphibian lives for five to six years. And at home, with normal care, these frogs can live up to eleven years.
The poison of the skin glands of the frog is not dangerous, it can only harm a small number of individuals. For a person, it does not pose a danger, and therefore a frog can be safely picked up. Often, the spadefoot itself becomes food for snakes, vipers, herons, storks, curlews, falcons, bitterns, black kites, black grouse, owls, eagle owls, tawny owls, badgers, crows, hedgehogs, polecats, foxes, minks. As you can see, such a small creature has more than enough enemies.
House spadefoot
In principle, the common spadefoot can also act as a pet. Keeping it in captivity should take place in a special terrarium of at least thirty liters. It must certainly have a reservoir, the water in which should be changed daily. On thethe bottom of the tank should be covered with a layer of soil five to eight centimeters thick, consisting of peat, tree bark and sand. Also, be sure to have green plants in the terrarium.
For adults, you do not need to additionally warm the air, twenty degrees will be enough, but you should observe the humidity of the air, it should be at least 75 percent, and it is better if its value is close to 90%. The spadefoot is a nocturnal creature, so you don't need to make lighting in the terrarium.
Young frog tadpoles should be fed a vegetable diet. Adults need ants, ground beetles, spiders, insect larvae, all of which make up more than eighty percent of their food. Also, spadeworts are very fond of eating earthworms and slugs. You need to purchase a frog in pet stores.
Difficulties in keeping an amphibian
If you decide to keep a frog at home, then you need to immediately evaluate all the difficulties associated with this. Is it so easy to care for common garlic? Systematics for controlling humidity, and for young individuals also for temperature, should become an indispensable condition for keeping a frog.
In addition, remember that the terrarium needs to be cleaned very often and the water changed daily. It is also not easy to get live food, and it is inconvenient to breed it at home, and this is not practical, since it can spread throughout the apartment. Frogs are able to escape from the terrarium and simply die in the apartment from dehydration, and thereforeyou need to keep it closed. Remember that the spadefoot is a nocturnal creature, so it is hardly worth hoping that you will be able to watch it during the daytime. This is not a pet that will entertain you, rather, you will need close attention and proper care.
Most likely, most of the time the frog will spend buried in the sand or substrate, and come out only for food. To maintain normal humidity, the terrarium must be sprayed inside with water. And for an amphibian shelter, you can put pieces of tree bark inside.
A rare sight
It should be noted that the habitat of the spadefoot is quite wide. She lives in Central and Eastern Europe, Western Asia. And yet, the amphibian is one of the rare species. For example, it is listed in the Red Book of Estonia, as well as the Red Book of the Moscow, Oryol and Lipetsk regions. Currently, there is no threat of its extinction. Rather, it is under protection as a rare little-studied amphibian. Such an unusual creature is the common spadefoot. The Red Book of the Moscow Region in the second edition already included the frog in its lists due to the fact that, compared to the last century, there were fewer places where it lives, and the number of individuals also suffered. It is believed that this is due to the long period of development of its offspring, as well as significant environmental pollution, which also significantly affects the spadefoot.
It should be noted that in the Red Book it is the Moscow Regionmany reptiles and amphibians have been introduced, this is explained by the fact that it is these animals that suffer the most from the anthropogenic influence of people due to their characteristics. Amphibians are very attached to their habitat, unlike other animals, they cannot migrate over long distances, moreover, they are directly connected to their reservoir. Currently, the decline in the number of amphibious creatures is observed around the world. Why this happens is unknown, no explanation has been found for this phenomenon.
