Vietnamese Mossy Frog Care Sheet

Vietnamese Mossy Frogs are experts when it comes to camouflage. Due to their coloring and unique skin texture, it can be difficult to see them when they are chilling on a tree or in vegetation on the ground near a stream, because they look like a clump of moss, especially when they have their eyes closed.

These frogs are relatively rare and can be hard to come by. If you do get lucky enough to locate some, you will pay an average of $100 a piece for them. They are actually a protected species in their native land of Vietnam.

Mossy frogs spend a lot of time in one place but at times can be very active as well, especially at feeding time. They sometimes remind me of a cat getting ready to pounce on a mouse. I've seen them jump from the top of one end of the tank, to the bottom at the opposite end of the tank to get a cricket!

As long as you understand their needs, the are not very difficult to care.

Housing Your Mossy Frog

If you want to keep your Mossy Frog happy and healthy, you should try to simulate their natural habitat as closely as possible.

The size tank you choose should be based on how many frogs you intend to have. You should allow 4 gallons of space per frog as their average size is 2 - 2 1/2 inches, and they are rather active at times. This will give the frogs plenty of space without being on top of each other. The videos below show a 20 gallon long tank that houses 5 frogs.

Tank Maintenance Video

Mossy Frog Care Video

Mossy frogs are semi-aquatic and should be supplied with both land and water of equal parts. Your land area should slope down into the shallow water side of the tank in order to make it easy for the frogs to make their way out of the water. The water side of the tank should be no more than a few inches deep. The frogs prefer to sit in water with a moving current, so you will need to have a pump, filter or waterfall that will simulate a running stream.

In my tank, shown above, I chose to split the land area and the water area into equal parts. In the center of the tank I installed a plexi-glass with aquarium sealant to divide water from land. For the land side, I installed a false bottom for drainage purposes and a layer of organic dirt and some moss. 

The left side of the tank, the water side, has a filter and waterfall in the back that creates a current that flows around to the front of the tank and a piece of Mopani wood to slow the current before it get to the land area. This gives the frogs the choice of calm water or current.

The tank the videos above is a great setup for juvenile frogs because, the juveniles tend to spend the majority of their time up off the ground when they are not in the water. The adults tend to migrate more to the land and water areas. For this reason, you will need to plan on providing a larger, longer tank for adults.

Water Quality

Be sure to only use distilled water or tap water that has been treated with a water conditioner such as Reptisafe. 

These frogs tend to do better when you do partial water changes, rather than draining the tank and refilling. Simple use and aquarium vacuum once a week to remove half the water, then replace.

Temperature and Lighting

Mossy frogs do not have any special requirements as far as temperature and lighting. They are perfectly fine with room temperature. I chose to provide lighting simply for esthetic reasons.

A couple things to keep in mind if you plan on using a light; be care not to use a light that is going to raise the temperature more that a degrees or two, you don't want to overheat your frogs, and only install the light along the back of the tank or over the end of the tank that you will not be feeding the frogs at. If they stare into the light while hunting their prey, it could damage their eyesight.

Filter

In order to keep the water fresh and clean, you will need to install An in the water filter. Mossy frogs prefer to relax in  water with a current. Most filters you will find are rather tall, so it's simple to add some rocks in front of the filter so the water flows down and creates a current. The steeper the rocks are, the faster the current. Be care though, you don't want a current that is so strong the frogs can't sit still in it.  

Referring back to the photo of my tank, you can see the method I used. I stacked the large flat rocks to create a running waterfall, then I installed a piece of Mopani Wood to obstruct the water flow before it reached the land area. Mopani wood works very well in this type of tank because it is heavy and will just sit on the bottom of the tank, rather than float.

Tank Furnishings

You will want to provide at least one hide for your frogs. Sometimes they just want to have a little privacy. In my tank, there is a climbing log on the land side that is hollow, so it serves two purposes, one as a hide and two, as a climbing log.

Mossy frogs do like to climb and they seem to enjoy pouncing on their prey from above, so you will need to include plants, vines and logs for them to perch on.

Diet

The Mossy frog diet will mainly consist of small crickets. Make sure the crickets you provide are no larger than the space between their eyes. This will prevent a possible choking hazard. Offer 3-4 crickets per frog, three to four times a week. A couple of times a month, you will want to provide a different food source for variety such as, wax worms, earth worms cut into small pieces and black worms. The worms will need to be fed from a shallow dish. Do not drop them into the tank or water.

Supplements

Your frogs are what they eat so be sure to provide them with good nutrition. You can dust their insects with a high quality nutritional supplement or you can gut load the insects with a highly nutritious diet such as Fluker's High-Calcium Cricket Diet  which is what I use.

In Conclusion:

Vietnamese Mossy Frogs are a bit complex to set up but, once they are set up, are relatively easy to care for. With the proper maintenance and diet, they will provide you with many years of enjoyment.