Clawed frog: 4 popular species and character complexity

Area

The scientific world learned about the clawed frog in 1802, and residents of the places where it lives have long been familiar with it as a delicacy.

Their habitat is ponds, lakes, swamps of Kenya, Congo, Uganda, Cameroon . In these countries, frogs are specially caught to prepare a delicious dish from them.

They lead an aquatic lifestyle and never go to land unless absolutely necessary. They are represented by different species, differing in size and color.

Appearance

The clawed frog has a small head, a large body and muscular hind legs. The length of an adult can reach 12–13 cm .

The flattened muzzle has round eyes that do not have sharp vision. To breathe, frogs need atmospheric oxygen.

On all four paws, the toes are connected by membranes, and strong claws grow at their tips.

Owners need them to protect them from enemies, tear apart caught prey, and hold them on plants.

Behavior and lifestyle

The smooth clawed frog, although it belongs to the amphibians, comes to land only if there is a need to change the reservoir .

Favorite habitats are bodies of water with slowly flowing or standing water.

During the day she is inactive, and at night she goes hunting. A predator by nature, the frog itself has excellent defense in the form of toxic mucus. If you can’t hold it in your hands, it will definitely slip out.

The mouth of a dog that tries to grab such prey becomes covered with thick foam, preventing normal breathing. However, owls, cormorants and herons calmly hunt the frog.

In the aquarium , he controls the territory, shows nervousness if he is afraid of his neighbors . It begins to rush around the pond, stirring up the water.

Unusually mobile and gluttonous. Swimming quickly around the aquarium, she devours everything that is suitable for food .

The snags and decorations lying at the bottom will definitely be turned over, and more than once, and the plants will be dug up or torn.

Lifespan

How long do the unusual inhabitants of your home pond live? In favorable aquarium conditions, where there are no dangerous enemies and the owner carefully monitors their health, clawed frogs can live 14–15 years .

Sexual dimorphism

Puberty in frogs occurs unevenly. Females are ready to mate at the age of 6 months, males mature at 9–10 months.

In a mature female, the ovipositor is clearly visible, resembling a tail in shape. In addition, she is larger than the male.

Sexual dimorphism

Sexual dimorphism is weakly expressed, the color is the same, but when compared, the females are slightly larger than the males. The easiest way to determine the sex of a frog is during the mating season - males sing loudly during this period, and black stripes appear on their front legs on the sides of the toes and along the paw to the armpit area, these are the so-called “mating brushes.”

The behavior of clawed frogs is very interesting, they are active, social, communicate with people with interest and even recognize the person who feeds them most often, and get used to taking food from hands.

Types of aquarium frogs

After the first species of clawed frog was described, scientists discovered about 18 of its species . Of these, only 5 species turned out to be suitable for keeping in aquariums.

Shportsevaya (xenopus)

Xenopus, or clawed water frog, has lived in South Africa since ancient times. Thanks to travelers, today it can be found in the waters of Chile, California and the UK.

The upper part of the body is colored greenish-olive and dark brown, complemented by dark spots. The abdomen is white or with brown spots.

Of particular interest to aquarists is the artificially bred albino clawed frog.

Large, up to 15 cm, it attracts attention with its pinkish-white color. The lifespan of a hybrid is shorter than that of an ordinary frog.

Attention! Albinos suffer from obesity.

African dwarf (Hymenochirus)

All of Equatorial Africa is where Hymenochirus lives in nature. It has firmly populated the warm waters of the Congo, Nigeria, Cameroon and Zaire. This species has an elongated body up to 3–4 cm and thin legs.

The muzzle is pointed, eyes without eyelids, located on the sides. Böttger's clawbearer is painted in gray-brown and dark gray tones.

The abdomen has lighter shades. Feels good in captivity and reproduces successfully.

American pipa

The original shape and impressive size distinguish the American pipa from its smaller relatives. The length of its strangely flattened body can reach 20 cm.

The square-shaped pipa is covered with wrinkled skin, colored in dull gray-brown tones.

It also has one more feature that does not bring joy to its owners: the frog emits the smell of hydrogen sulfide.

Toadstools

The small toad, up to 6 cm, is very beautiful. She has lumpy skin along her back, the main tone of which is brown, and dark green spots are scattered over it.

And as a bright touch to the image - an orange or red belly with randomly outlined spots of black and blue.

The frog's large eyes have triangular pupils. Due to the unique structure of the tongue, which is attached with the lower part to the oral cavity, fire-bellied toads cannot croak.

However, they are not dumb. The sound they make is reminiscent of a drawn-out “oo-oo-oo”.

Lilliputians in the shadow of Gullivers: why caring for megafauna is not enough to preserve ecosystems

Despite the challenges mentioned above, the conservation of charismatic megafauna and small species are not in conflict. On the contrary, in some cases giants help preserve the “invisibles”. Thus, the American bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), along with other birds of prey, suffered from the widespread use of the pesticide DDT in the last century, was chosen as the “face” of the campaign to ban this chemical. Having played on the patriotic feelings of Americans, environmentalists achieved their goal: the pesticide was phased out, the eagle population recovered so successfully that now this species is no longer considered vulnerable, and hundreds of other species affected by DDT also breathed a sigh of relief. In nature reserves and national parks where, say, jaguars and Amur tigers are protected, other fauna can breathe easy: birds, fish, amphibians, small mammals... However, this does not always work. To preserve a species, it is necessary to at least know its life cycle: where it lives, what it eats, what conditions it needs to reproduce.

The amount of research devoted to charismatic megafauna is enormous - we know almost everything about the life of these creatures. At the same time, the collections of zoological museums and institutes still contain enough species known from literally one specimen. No one has seen them since they were described, which means no one even knows if they still exist in the wild.

We have absolutely no data about these creatures. Naturally, it is impossible to carry out clear environmental activities with such input data. But while projects for the conservation of “unpresentable” species are desperately trying to find funding, which, like a magnet, is pulled away by “charismatics”, their charges simply quietly disappear before scientists have the opportunity to get to know them better. Often, new species, having only been described, already receive protected status.

For example, the amazing devil gecko (Uroplatus finaritra), discovered in Madagascar in 2021, was considered Endangered due to poachers who caught the lizards for sale even before the species was scientifically described. And the glass frog (Nymphargus manduriacu) from an Ecuadorian private reserve was considered Critically Endangered - all because of the Australian mining company BHP Hillinton, whose drills are ready to pierce the forests along with all the endangered species.

The problem is not limited to reptiles and amphibians. Thus, in March 2019, a group of ornithologists from Singapore and Indonesia visited the tropical island of Nias, located near Sumatra and belonging to the so-called Western Sumatran Islands, for the first time in 80 years. Their goal was to determine the taxonomic status of several species of local birds, and at the same time assess the state of the island ecosystems.

Thanks to their isolation from the outside world, tropical islands often become home to endemics - unique creatures found nowhere else in the world. As examples, we can recall the famous dodo bird and the Galapagos tortoises. It turned out that out of more than 60 species and subspecies of birds potentially endemic to the Western Sumatran Islands, 43 are actually endemic, and 23 are found only on Nias. These included, for example, the cuckoo dove (Macropygia [modigliani] modigliani), the crested snake eagle (Spilornis [cheela] asturinus) and a unique population of the Lesser owl (Strix [leptogrammica] niasensis), which differs from others in size, voice and color details, and therefore potentially worthy of being identified as a new species.

Moreover, ornithologists noted five species of birds not previously seen here, and also discovered the world's largest population of silver dove (Columba argentina) - at least 50 individuals. This species of large wood pigeons is so secretive and rare that in the second half of the 20th century, many scientists were confident of its extinction.

However, not everything is so rosy. Forests on Nias, as throughout Southeast Asia, were almost completely destroyed in favor of rubber plantations. Tiny areas of degraded natural forests remain only in the far north and east of the island, which means that species that cannot adapt to anthropogenic landscapes are already doomed to death.

Moreover, a number of endemic species and subspecies of birds have not been found in the wild at all: these include, for example, the local subspecies of the orange-bellied trogon (Harpactes oreskios nia) and the red-crested woodpecker (Picus puniceus soligae). Although researchers do not draw premature conclusions about the complete extinction of these taxa, the likelihood of this is very high.

Unfortunately, such cases are not uncommon. One of the most telling is the story of the Loan whistler (Telmatobius dankoi), a funny, bug-eyed frog that lives in a single stream in the middle of the Chilean Atacama Desert. Or rather, it lived: when in June 2019, herpetologist Andres Charrier and his colleagues decided to conduct another monitoring of the whistler population, it turned out that the stream had dried up. This did not happen due to natural processes: water was illegally diverted to fields and mines, and, judging by the state of the vegetation, in the spring.

After three days of continuous searching, the team caught the last 14 miraculously surviving individuals from a dirty stagnant puddle.

The frogs were skinny and half-dead, like prisoners of a concentration camp; it seemed that this was where the story of the species ended.

Fortunately, of the 14 individuals delivered to the zoo, 12 survived and even gave birth to offspring - as many as 180 tadpoles. But a happy ending is still far away, because the only habitat of the whistlers has been destroyed and it is unclear whether the resurrected population will be returned to nature. Meanwhile, species like the whistler, forgotten by humanity, still continue to rapidly disappear. With a whistle.

Content

If you do not pay attention to the willful behavior, keeping and caring for the clawed frog does not pose any particular difficulties.

Aquarium

For clawed frogs, the aquarium should be rectangular, short in height and long .

The volume of water for one individual is at least 35 liters. If you plan to keep 2-3 frogs - at least 70 liters.

Attention! The container is filled with water right up to the sides - dropsy does not need open islands of land.

Water parameters

The water parameters should not contain nitrogen compounds and chlorine; the main indicators are as follows:

• temperature - 19...25 °C;
• acidity - 6.5–7.5 pH;
• hardness - 2–12 dGh.

Water is replaced by 1/3 of the volume once a week. The use of an external filter will reduce the frequency to once every 2 weeks.

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Substrate or primer

The choice of substrate is not so much a rational necessity as a trick that owners go to in order not to use soil.

Spending a lot of time at the bottom, clawed amphibians stir up small fractions and swallow large pebbles. Pebbles fall into the frog's stomach and clog it, which can lead to the death of the amphibian.

A piece of dark fabric equal in size to the bottom of the aquarium is used as a substrate . It is allowed to decorate the bottom with stones or plastic plants glued to it.

When using river sand, the process of cleaning the reservoir becomes more frequent. In addition, sand clogs the filter. The best option is small pebbles .

Plants

And again we are looking for an alternative between living material and artificial ones .

Conventional aquarium plants will not be suitable, since frogs will quickly damage them with their sharp claws.

Plastic ones look beautiful, but they get more dirty, and you will have to wash them more often, and they can harm frogs with their hard edges.

Professionals advise giving preference to Anubias. All species of this plant have leaves with a strong structure.

However, it should not be planted in the ground, but in weighted pots. As a compromise, you can use artificial plants made from silk.

Shelters

Amphibians have a positive attitude towards shelters. All kinds of caves, coconuts, grottoes, and jugs are suitable for them .

The main thing is that the shelter is spacious, without sharp edges and holds firmly to the bottom.

Filtration

To ensure that the water always remains clean, which is what clawed frogs love, an aquarium with them needs a powerful filter , but it should not create a strong current in the reservoir.

This means that it is better to install an external model.

Please note that the amphibians themselves, demanding crystal clear water, do everything to pollute it. Such picky people!

Lighting

Their need for light is small. The duration of daylight hours is no more than 12 hours .

Living plants require more lighting than amphibians.

Attention! Bright lighting is contraindicated for Spur albinos - they can go blind from it.

Soil and decor

The soil in the aquarium must be large so that the frog does not swallow it. You can use anything as decoration. The main thing is that it does not have sharp corners that could injure the pet and is heavy so that he cannot move it from its place. The decorations used are placed in different corners so that the frog has room to jump. If you provide shelters, they should be wide enough so that an adult frog can easily climb in and out of it.

Care

It seems to be a simple creation, but it has its own special requirements for content.

Frogs are not picky when choosing food , they do not need aeration, but caring for them has its own difficulties.

Feeding

Frogs are omnivores, moreover, they are all terrible gluttons. In a small space in a home aquarium, where they lack freedom of movement, you need to carefully monitor the dosage and caloric content of food.

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The diet of amphibians includes:

• bloodworm;
• fresh fish;
• shrimp meat;
• beef and beef heart.

Some frog owners pamper their pets with small species of aquarium fish. is also suitable for them , for example, Tetra ReptoFrog Granules .

Young individuals are given food every day, adults only need 2-3 times a week.

Where to put?

In Feng Shui there can be no trifles or insignificant moments. Therefore, you need to know where to place the money toad in order for it to actually attract financial success to you. Incorrect use of traditional talismans can, on the contrary, be harmful.

The three-toed frog is afraid of heights, so Feng Shui experts advise placing this figurine on a small table or bedside table. The main thing is that it is not high, but not on the floor. Also, you can’t plant it in front of you.

The money frog is often placed with its back to the front door of the house. Thus, it appears that she has just jumped into the house, bringing money and good fortune with her. If she is turned to face the exit, according to the principles of Feng Shui, she will only take money away from your home.

Also, the toad can be placed closer to the southeastern sector of the house, since it is considered the wealth sector

It is important that she does not look at other doors or windows in the house. Only when the toad’s gaze is directed indoors does the energy of wealth go straight to you

Another option is the living room. To be more precise, the left corner of the living room, located diagonally from the entrance. We will not go into details, but simply note that the Chinese call it the “angle of Power”.

An aquarium is the best place to store a money frog.

Finally, the most advantageous place for a frog is inside the aquarium. It in itself is considered a talisman of prosperity and financial stability, but if you put a toad in it, the effect will be even stronger and more targeted.

Some sources advise using not one, but 9 money toads at the same time. If you are interested in this idea, place each figure in a separate sector of Ba Gua. Moreover, they still need to be hidden so that strangers do not see the toad. If you don’t have reliable shelters for 9 talismans, use 3 or 6.

A talisman made of jadeite can be placed not only in your apartment, but also in your office. The same rules apply: use a compass to find the southeastern (money) sector of the home and place a figurine in it, turning it so that its eyes look deep into the room. If you place a money toad on the table, it is best to use the upper left corner of your desktop.

Compatibility with other aquarium inhabitants

Both experts and the owners of the original inhabitants believe that the clawed frog does not need neighbors .

Small species of fish will become food for her, and proximity to large predators will lead to equal stress for all inhabitants of the aquarium.

Sharp jerks of amphibians can frighten the same cichlids, and they will respond with an attack. Both sides will suffer, and as a result, you will not get any pleasure from keeping them together.

Classification, representatives of the order Rodents

In total, as of 2005, 2277 species of rodents were described. In the past, they were divided into three suborders based on the structure of the jaw muscles. Today there are 5 suborders and more than 28 families.

Suborder Myomorpha

Consists of eight families:

• mouse;
• mouseworms;
• jerboas;
• mole rats;
• spinaceae;
• hamsters;
• hareliphamsters;
• mouse-hamster.

Almost 2/3 of all rodent species belong to one single mouse family (Muridae). This family contains 1,303 known species, and this number is constantly increasing as a result of new discoveries. Murids are distributed throughout the world, including Australia and New Guinea, where they are the only land-based placental mammals (not counting the recently introduced rabbits). They represent the family mainly of mice and rats.

Field mouse (Apodemus agranius)

Representatives of the mole rat family (Spalacidae) are most adapted to life underground. Their eyes are completely hidden under the skin, and their ears and tail are absent.

Common mole rat (Spalax microphthalmus)

To a greater or lesser extent, all representatives of the jerboa family (Dipodidae) are adapted for movement by jumping or rebound running.

Long-eared jerboa (Euchoreutes naso)

Suborder Squirrel-like (Sciuromorpha)

Consists of three families:

• squirrel;
• aplodontiaceae;
• dormouse.

The squirrel family (Sciuridae) is the second most diverse after the mouse family (including 273 species). Representatives of squirrels are distributed throughout Europe, Africa, North and South America. The common squirrel is its most famous representative. This also includes gophers, chipmunks and marmots.

Common squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris)

Dormice (Gliridae) are a cross between mice and squirrels in appearance. They are the only rodents that do not have a cecum, indicating a low amount of cellulose in their diet.

The only species of the family Aplodontiidae is Aplodontiidae (mountain beaver).

Suborder Beavers (Castorimorpha)

Presented in three families:

• beavers;
• gopheraceae;
• pouchhopper.

Beavers (Castoridae) are large rodents with cheek pouches and strong limbs. The most famous, of course, is the beaver. It is famous primarily for the fact that it can change the landscape in its habitat. Using powerful cutters, he cuts down trees, building dams and huts from this material (more about beavers in this article).

Representatives of the gopher family (Geomyidae) spend most of their lives underground in their own burrow system. Outwardly they look like moles.

Plains gopher (Geomys bursarius)

Sacrifuges (Heteromyidae) are nocturnal burrowers that inhabit diverse landscapes in the Americas.

Suborder Porcupines (Hystricomorpha)

This suborder unites about 300 species in 18 families (agoutiaceae, porcupines, pigs, mole rats, chinchillas, rock rats, etc.).

Most of them are large rodents that live within South and Central America. Among them, the most famous are porcupines, guinea pigs, mole rats, nutria, chinchillas, etc.

North American porcupine (Erethizon dorsatum)

Suborder Spiketails (Anomaluromorpha)

Includes 2 families:

• long-legged;
• spiny-tailed.

The first family (Pedetidae) is represented by one species - the long-legged, living on the African plains. This animal looks like a miniature kangaroo.

Strider (Pedetes capensis)

Spiketails (Anomaluridae) from the rain forests of Africa are similar in appearance to squirrels, but are very distantly related to them.

Squirrel Spiketail (Zenkerella insignis)

Reproduction of aquarium frogs

Sexual maturity occurs in frogs at 3 years of age. They mate once a year, from September to December .

The impetus for reproduction is to transplant the pair into a separate container and lower the water temperature in it by 5–8 degrees over several weeks. Then the parameter is returned to its usual values.

Attention! The spawning tank must be large so that the future juveniles feel comfortable and develop properly.

You can learn about the readiness of individuals to reproduce by a peculiar vocal signal from the males: they begin to slowly “tick.”

Pairing

The male, ready for mating, swims up to the female from behind and clasps her with his paws. They spend about an hour in this position, swimming around the aquarium, after which the eggs begin to hatch.

Coming out of the anus of the female, the egg rolls along the ventral groove of the male, is fertilized by him and sticks to the leaves of the plant.

The formed masonry is covered with a reliable protective layer . Frogs begin molting after mating.

The old skin slowly falls off, giving way to new tissue. It doesn't fall to the bottom, the frogs eat it.

Caviar

Egg laying lasts 6–7 hours. The number of eggs in a clutch depends on the fertility of the female; it can contain from 200 to 2000 eggs .

During the development of eggs and tadpoles, the water temperature remains within 25 °C.

Until the larvae begin to breathe on their own (bubbles appear), enhanced aeration is carried out.

Tadpoles

The transition from a tadpole to a full-fledged amphibian takes 2–2.5 months.

on their own 5–6 days after hatching . They filter the water through filter holes.

You will have to take care of food for them in advance. You need to buy dried nettle at the pharmacy and pour boiling water over it for 2 hours. Then the resulting infusion is filtered through cheesecloth and poured into the spawning tank.

In addition to nettles, tadpoles can be given powdered milk and powdered infant formula , observing a moderate dosage.

For the proper development of juveniles, it is necessary to add floating plants (Elodea canadensis) to the aquarium and create diffused lighting.

Don't buzz: what is an “insectocalypse” and how does it threaten humanity?

Insects are another systematic group that is not particularly loved by humanity. Usually we notice six-legged animals only when they eat our food, suck blood and climb into the tent during the summer holidays. However, “inconspicuous” does not mean “useless”; moreover, insects are one of the most important living creatures on the planet.

John Burdon Sanderson Haldane, the founder of modern genetics, once remarked: “The Creator must have had an immense love for bugs.” And it’s true: there are almost 400 thousand species of beetles alone, or Coleoptera (Coleoptera). But the class of insects is not limited to them - these tiny workers of ecosystems are everywhere, and they do work without which all living beings would have a very hard time.

Insects pollinate plants to allow fruits to ripen, eat dead organic matter to keep us from drowning in mountains of corpses and manure, and serve as the basis of the food chain in most ecosystems. They appeared on Earth approximately 400 million years ago, in the Devonian period - and since then our planet has not been the same. But now entomologists around the world have begun to record sad dynamics: the numbers of many species are rapidly and steadily declining. This phenomenon is called “insectocalypse.” Scientists from Germany were the first to sound the alarm. For 27 years - from 1989 to 2016 - they collected flying insects with special traps at 60 points across the country to estimate the biomass of the insects.

The results were shocking: in recent years, the number of six-legged animals has decreased by 75%!

The most alarming thing was that the research was carried out in nature reserves: that is, extinction occurred even where nature is strictly protected. The reason for what was happening was completely incomprehensible: the mortality of insects could not be associated either with the weather, or with the use of this or that landscape by humans, or with the characteristics of a particular biotope. The findings from similar studies in other parts of the world are also disappointing. Thus, in Puerto Rico, the population decline over 35 years ranged, according to various estimates, from 75% to 98%. Finally, a larger study was conducted that included data from 1,766 locations around the world. It showed that many species are indeed declining in numbers at a rate of about 9% per decade. This mainly affected flying insects.

One possible reason is light pollution: everyone knows how moths and other arthropods fly into light. This disrupts the life rhythm of insects, reducing the time for food production and reproduction. Positive dynamics were noted only in aquatic insects, such as swimming beetles or water bugs. Alas, this does not compensate for losses among terrestrial species; Moreover, many insects that develop in water (mayflies, mosquitoes) have flying adult stages.

Diseases

Diseases affecting clawed frogs are largely associated with errors in care.

Poor water purification, low temperature, dirty food are the main causes of disease. What problems may arise:

1. Sepsis, or “red leg” . An infectious disease marked by redness of the abdomen and blanching of the skin on the back. As sepsis progresses, the paws swell and ulcers appear. Treatment: baths with a solution of sulfadimidine (15 ml of medicine per 10 liters of water).
2. Fungus , in which the affected areas are distinguished by growths of a cotton structure. Salt baths help kill the fungus.
3. Dropsy . The main symptom is that the frog's body swells. The patient needs to be placed in a container with a solution of Gentomycin.
4. Nematodes . Parasites enter the amphibian's body with food. The skin becomes gray, appetite disappears, and small worms can be seen in areas of peeling. Treatment uses drugs against nematodes (Piperazine or Panacur).

Funny and smart, clawed frogs, unlike fish, often become pets and almost family members.

They are given names, their lives are observed by young and old. With proper care, this warm contact can last for many years.

Instead of an afterword: a treasury for humanity, or the hidden benefits of invisible species

In the 1960s–1970s, the Japanese Osamu Shimomura, working at Princeton University, isolated two fluorescent proteins from the aequorea jellyfish (Aequorea victoria) - aequorin and GFP (Green Fluorescent Protein).,

aka green fluorescent protein. In 1994, the journal Science published research by Martin Chalfie, who made this protein work in Escherichia coli cells. It turned out that GFP is incredibly convenient for use in genetic engineering: roughly speaking, if you attach the gene responsible for its work in the cell to another molecular sequence that needs to be inserted into the DNA of the organism, you can easily understand whether the attempt to introduce genes was successful. If a luminous protein appears in cells and organs, it means that both it and the other sequences are integrated in the right place.

Chalfie and Shimomura's research was confirmed independently by Roger Tsien, and all three were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2008 for their discovery.

Might be interesting

The end of the golden age: why people should no longer rely on progress

In 2021, Australian scientists who studied the biochemistry of the venom of one of the local spiders (Hadronyche infensa) discovered the so-called Hi1a peptide in it. The introduction of this substance into the ventricles of the brain of rats suffering from neuronal death after a stroke significantly reduced the area of ​​necrosis. By blocking potassium channels in cells, the peptide improved the situation not only in the peri-infarction zone (an area of ​​slow cell death), but also in the zone of central necrosis, where neurons die almost instantly. What is most surprising is that the drug was effective when administered eight hours after arterial thrombosis. If these species became extinct, humanity would not have two substances at its disposal that could radically change our lives for the better. In the stories of the spider and the jellyfish lies the answer to the question of why people themselves need biological diversity.

Signs of bad weather

Impending bad weather throughout the year can be identified by insects

Pay attention to the behavior of ants, dragonflies, bees

Mosquitoes, gadflies and horseflies become very aggressive when they sense that it will rain soon. They start rushing around and attacking people. This happens because in rainy weather they are unable to move and eat, so they have to eat in advance before the storm.

A bad forecast based on folk signs can be made if you pay attention to. They begin to give signals, foreshadowing bad weather

• Honeysuckle smells very strongly half an hour before it rains.
• Towards bad weather, calendula unfurls its corollas; The water lily, clover and hollyhock shrink.
• Burdock opens its thorns to the rain.
• If honey and coniferous trees begin to smell very strongly and secrete resin or nectar, this is a sure sign that heavy rain will begin in two hours.

How to make a forecast using animals

Ancient signs also include knowledge of how animals behave before bad weather.

• If the fish jumps high and catches midges, wait for a downpour.
• Before the rain, crayfish behave calmly, frogs begin to croak loudly, wild ducks hide in the reeds and do not come out for a long time.
• A sure sign of bad weather are seagulls
  if they behave restlessly, scream loudly and fly from place to place.

If you have pets, pay attention to their behavior

From time immemorial, humanity has tried to unravel the mysteries of the surrounding nature and predict its condition for the near future. Observations, notes, signs about the weather, their general patterns - all this empirical knowledge was carefully systematized and carefully passed on to subsequent generations.

And it is not surprising that for our ancestors the factor of natural phenomena was so important, because they had to wander, and equip squalid dwellings, and somehow predict their harvests. Now, however, people no longer know how to so subtly notice the slightest changes in the world around them, and the urgent need for this has disappeared, since our well-being and plans for the future depend on much more serious factors than the weather outside the window.

However, sometimes you just need to know exactly what the day, month or entire season will be like. So why not turn to the invaluable experience of our ancestors, since nature itself had a hand in this? And to understand the language of Mother Nature, you just need to listen and look closely - there are many clues around.

Feeding

One of the most exciting processes, as over time, clawed frogs can take food from your hands. At the same time, you don’t have to be afraid of bites, since they don’t have teeth. As well as the language, however.

What to feed? The choice is large. This can also be special food for aquatic frogs and turtles. This could be a live fish, such as a guppy. These could be insects from a pet store. Some even feed food for dogs and cats, but this is not recommended!

In general, live, frozen, artificial food - the clawed frog eats everything. Including carrion.

In any case, remember about balance and alternate feeds.

How much food to give a frog needs to be determined experimentally. Much depends on age and size. As a rule, they are fed daily, giving as much as the frog can eat within 15-30 minutes.

Overfeeding usually causes less problems than underfeeding, as they simply stop eating when they are full. In general, you need to look at how your frog eats and looks. If she is obese, then feed her every other day, if she is thin, then daily and give her different foods.

What do the signs say?

1. If a frog accidentally crawls into the house, this is a very good sign. Such a “guest” brought not only goodness to the house, but also financial well-being.
2. A frog in the house means something good will definitely happen soon. Joy will come unexpectedly and from an unexpected direction.
3. If you have a frog “living” in your house, even if it’s not a real one, then as soon as you have money, you need to stroke it with your hand, then money will literally appear out of thin air and will “delight” your wallet much more often.
4. If the newlyweds saw a frog in the house, it means that everything will be good and prosperous in their married life, this is for goodness and prosperity. Therefore, frog figurines are often given as gifts for weddings, especially those that “sit” on money or “hold” coins in their mouths.
5. If a family member is leaving on a long and dangerous journey, then put in his pocket a frog toy that was kept at home; nothing bad will happen to the person on the way.
6. With the “arrival” of a frog in the house, good luck enters.
7. If you manage to catch a frog in the house and you clearly don’t like this neighborhood, then you should take it outside. When releasing him into the wild, make any wish; as a “gratitude” it will certainly come true.

In general, if you have the honor of finding a frog in your house, then don’t worry, this messenger will not bring anything bad. Just take her and set her free! You will very soon notice that after this “visit” there will be much fewer problems and quarrels in your home, peace and well-being will come. Joy and peace will settle in the house!

People who do not believe in various signs at all begin to notice various signs over time. It happens that you don’t understand the meaning of this or that sign, but you still hope only for the good. There are a huge number of superstitions in the world, the main characters of which are animals.

For example, a cat, if it washes itself, expect guests; if it scratches the floor, there will be wind. Sparrows sing in the rain. The squirrel carries nuts and cones into the hollow - there will be a cold and long winter.

What is the significance of a frog or toad appearing in the house? A frog on the threshold of our house is a good omen. These animals always portend an increase in the well-being of the home. But despite this, some people do not consider frogs to be cute creatures. What's the matter?