African Bull Frog Care Sheet

The Giant African Bullfrog is one of the mainstays of the amphibian animal keeping world. It's one of the largest amphibians on the planet; they can get up to a massive 9." As with all frogs, they are more of a look-at than a handle pet. This is due to their sensitive skin; the oils on our own skin can damage them. These bullfrogs can also be quite ornery, so you might get chomped getting near them.

African bullfrogs do well with a glass terrarium as their enclosure. This is because glass is great at allowing heat to escape, ensuring that the enclosure stays cool enough. Other enclosures, such as wooden vivariums are far too efficient at retaining heat.

The African bullfrog's vivarium should be at least 600mm in length and 300mm in height. The African bullfrog is going to grow to around 9", so they need a space large enough for them to move around in.

African bullfrogs require a near-constant air temperature of 75°F. This is best achieved by sticking a heat mat on one side of the glass enclosure. This heat mat is regulated using a thermostat to make sure the temperature stays constant.

As the glass is only being heated on one side, this also creates a small temperature gradient within the enclosure, allowing the frog to warm itself up or move away to cool down.

If the enclosure cannot reach the target temperature with the heat mat alone, a small basking bulb may be placed in the canopy, as long as the temperature does not exceed 75-80°F.

The African Bullfrog requires UVB lighting because it is a diurnal species. As they are active during the day, they would get plenty of sunlight during the hours they are most active; this is something that needs to be replicated in captivity. The African Bullfrog is in Ferguson Zone 1.

The UV is required as otherwise the frog could experience some fatal health issues like Metabolic Bone Disease (MBD), Stunted growth, and a weakened immune system. While proper supplementation is also required for these issues, providing the Bullfrog with the UV will help them synthesize the nutrients in the supplements.

For the Bullfrog, as they want it quite humid, we would recommend a soil-based substrate such as Bio Life, Plantation soil, or something similar. You would then want to mix this with some Sphagnum moss and leaf litter, which helps the substrate retain humidity.

We recommend a large waterbowl that's big enough for them to sit in, as they do love to sit in standing water if possible. Providing a hide and some other forms of cover, be that artificial plants or the now more commonly seen real plants in a bioactive setup, so that they can hide from the light of the UV/Lamp if they want to.

African bullfrogs are carnivorous and have a diet consisting mainly of live foods. The core of the live food diet should be high in protein and relatively easy to digest. We have found that brown crickets are the most readily accepted, but you can also use black crickets or locusts (hoppers). On occasion, for variation, you can offer other bugs such as mealworms, waxworms, or calciworms.

African bullfrogs can also be fed small pinky mice or earthworms once a week to add a bit more protein to their diet.

African Bullfrogs will get most of what they need from their diet, but there are some vitamins and minerals that they require in higher concentrations. These are normally provided in the form of calcium and vitamin powders, which are dusted onto the live food.

There are many brands and types of supplements, but normally they come down to a pure calcium, calcium and vitamin or vitamin only supplement. Within these groups, they will also either include or exclude synthetic vitamin D3. Vitamin D3 is produced by reptiles when exposed to UVB, and, among other functions, it allows the monitor lizard to use the calcium in its diet. If you are sure that the UVB levels in your enclosure are perfect, you can use a supplement without D3; if you are not sure, it would be best to use a supplement with some D3.

In our store, we currently use a simple calcium powder with D3 and a balanced multi-vitamin with D3 called Nutrobal. For most of the animals, we alternate these daily so that they get their vitamins every other day while getting calcium every day.

A male and female bullfrog would breed if left together in the same enclosure. Under no circumstances should two males be housed together as they will fight each other.

The female lays about 3,000 to 4,000 eggs at a time. The tadpoles hatch, and after two days, start feeding on vegetation, small fish, invertebrates, and even each other. Defending males continue to watch over the tadpoles, which metamorphose within three weeks. During the tadpole's development, the father guards his young. Due to the male bullfrog's overprotective behaviour, he pounces and bites anything that he views as a threat. If the pool is in danger of drying out, the father uses his legs and head to dig a canal from the drying pond to a bigger pond. He continues to guard the tadpoles until they are old enough to fend for themselves, although he may also eat some of them

Giant Bullfrogs, as with most pets, require a clean environment to thrive. We recommend a spot clean as often as possible (every day) and a full clean every 4 weeks or so. If you are keeping the monitor lizard in a bioactive enclosure, you can spot clean and monitor the enclosure. It may still be a good idea to change out the bedding a few times per year.

When cleaning the enclosure, you should remove your animal, all decorations, and all of the bedding. Once the enclosure is clear, you can spray it all over with a reptile-friendly disinfectant. These usually work very quickly and only need to be left for around 30 seconds. Instructions can normally be found on the disinfectant packaging. Once the disinfectant has done its work it can be wiped away from the surfaces with a paper towel. In some cases, you might want to repeat this process a second time to ensure that the enclosure is thoroughly cleaned.

Your decorations can be cleaned in a similar method, simply spray them down with the disinfectant and rinse thoroughly with water before drying them off and putting them back into the enclosure. We recommend this process is done during the daytime to make sure that the Bullfrog will be going back to a warm terrarium for at least an hour before the basking lamps are turned off for the night.