2014 OHIO East Liberty 2 - Gone Froggin'

As you read in December, Kathy invited us down to Ohio to join her in purchasing some exotic frogs. On that trip she got four Dendrobates leucomelas or "lucs" for short. At the time they were no bigger than a thumb nail and now are about the size of a quarter. They are black and yellow and have a pleasant chirp as they mature. K says they are starting to chirp now, but very quietly.

Well, K is an "enthusiast" and whatever her current interest is, she dives in with an ardent passion. After breaking into the frog world with the above, she soon found that she had to have some more--this time a species of blue ones called Dendrobates azureus. So today we journeyed to Springfield, Ohio to see a different breeder.

He did not have the huge operation that we saw last time, maybe seven terrariums, but he had some colorful frogs that we had not seen to date. K had her heart set on the blue-ies and bought four.

We spent an hour talking frog diseases, terrarium styles, sources of frogs, pet shop horrors, reptile shows, Hank Molt, species of frog, and stages of frog development from polliwog to full-fledged frog. To demonstrate this last topic, the frog breeder had a plastic tub with many smaller sized containers. Each had live specimens at different stages in the maturity process. Very interesting.

Then the question of diet came up. They talked flightless fruit flies which had been K's frog's main diet up til now. The breeder suggested orange isopods, which look like orange sherbet colored roly-poly bugs with lots of legs. He says the frogs eat isopod eggs and isopods eat the frog poop for a "nice" symbiotic relationship. This may be too much info for some (including me), but fascinating food chain facts. K bought a container of isopods!!!

From there we went to the Micro Center. A huge all tech related store. As we walked in the door they had a display of 3-D printers for as low as $400. We want one, but not ready yet. What we were in the market for today was a webcam set up so we can watch K's frogs from our home in Michigan. We purchased that and a few other goodies. Really fun shopping here!!

Next was lunch at the place we enjoyed so much on our last trip--Cafe Paradisio in Urbana. The panini sandwiches were not quite as good as our last meal, a little dry. Definitely will go back, but order pasta next time.

Then hurried home to set up the new terrarium and webcam. Didn't want the froggies out in the cold for too long.


Traveling back we saw three covered bridges (even though we were in Logan, not Madison, County). We crossed one which is very cool. K&J say they have a bridge party every year where they close off the bridge to traffic and have a white tablecloth picnic. Might try to fit that in this summer.

Back home we introduced the new blue frogs to their environment. They seemed a little less shy about coming out for us to see them. The webcam process was a bit slow on the learning curve. (It took a few days, but we are able to some them from Michigan now...in color. Yay!)

K made wonderful shrimp and smoked Gouda cheese quiche for dinner and toast from her homemade bread. We washed them down with mimosas. For dessert we attacked the treat basket. It is going down fast.