Fire-Bellied Toads: Care Basics

Fire-bellied toads are frogs. Sometimes I'll refer to them by their full common name (fire-bellied toad or FBT), or just as frogs. Don't panic. People just refer to them as toads because they're bumpy.

Before you decide to get fire-bellied toads

Is it legal to own fire-bellied toads where you live? They are illegal to own in some states due to the risk they pose to native ecosystems. Check, be a responsible pet owner, and follow the law. You may need to obtain a permit from your state's fish and wildlife department.

Speed Overview

These guys are my favorite pet amphibian to work with for these main reasons:

• They are diurnal, which means they're actually out and visible during the day

• They're hardy, their environmental parameters don't require complex equipment to manage

• They do great in groups, which makes them more enjoyable to watch

• Their enclosure setups can be gorgeous once you add in live plants, which are easy to keep alive in a paludarium (part land, part water) setup

Why are they hard to find?

They don't seem to breed as readily in captivity as some other frog species, so the number produced and available each year in the US is fairly small. The number of people willing to pay a fair price for the work that goes into raising them (~$50/ea is honestly a bargain) is also fairly small, which means there isn't much incentive for more keepers to produce them.

How big do they get?

Max adult size can vary. In the photo below, the adult on the right (in my hand) is the size most of our full grown adults are. The adult male on the left is unrelated to them and notably larger. There are a lot of environmental factors that contribute to the max size an amphibian grows to, so keep in mind size variation is not necessarily genetic.

Example of two full-grown adult males.

How long do they live?

They live a long time in captivity, so normally they pass due to environmental condition mishaps rather than "old age" conditions of an aging body. They can easily hit 15-20 years old, if nothing major goes wrong.

What do they eat?

Literally any terrestrial invert that catches their eye! They mainly eat "land food" (ie they're not going to try to eat aquatic creatures) though if something is floating on the water's surface, they may eat it.

We feed a lot of springtails, isopods, fruit flies, and fly/beetle larvae to bitty babies, and juveniles and adults eat XS or S dubia, isopods, crickets, various fly/beetle larvae, and occasionally black soldier flies for the enrichment of working harder for their food!

The general rule of thumb "don't feed bugs that are longer than the space between their eyes" works well for FBT. Smaller bugs are just fine. Bigger bugs they may try to eat, but will spit out if too big.

What does an ideal setup look like?

You'll want a paludarium setup, where approximately 1/3 of the space is "land" and 2/3rds of the space is shallow water. They spend most of their time at the edges of the water. The "land" portion is mainly a place to put their food, and space for them to explore/hide/look for food when they feel like it. It's like the reverse of an enclosure that is "all land except for the water dish" - they thrive in "all water except for the food dish."

Their water does not need to be deep: 1-3" is sufficient! It's okay if the water is deeper, just keep in mind they'll be up at the surface. We tend to keep our babies in <1" of water because it's safer to move around small enclosures with less water in them.

If you are moving a container with frogs in it, the biggest danger is items shifting due to water buoyancy. Be super careful that they don't get pinched or squished between dishes, rocks, etc!

Here's a current example of our adult setup, although I look forward to sprucing it up a lot this summer! This is a front-opening Exo-Terra, 24x18x12". The water is only about 1.5" deep and goes through a lazy trickle filter to pull out large debris - otherwise we do water changes whenever there's visible waste or algae to tidy up. Their food dish (the round glass dish) is effectively an island, which helps reduce the number of bugs that escape and try to hide in the plants. Their lighting is a 12" T5 UVB plus two LED lights. We have a mini halogen lamp that we turn on occasionally in the winter to boost the water temperature after feeding.

Here's a very basic quarantine / short term setup: it's just a small square tub, with two nested lids. The first is just a "frog baffle" - an upper rim that prevents side-climbers from escaping when the upper screened lid is taken off. They have about 0.5" of water, rocks, a dish to contain their food, and a little bark hide/bridge. You'll notice that there's no heat/light/filtration. We just do water changes weekly or so, and they are happy at ambient temps! They are under an LED light indoors, but we take this small setup out into our yard for some authentic sunlight when the weather permits.

Essential supplies: 

• Your enclosure, whether front or top opening, should have a secure lid/screen and be easy to get into for feeding, water maintenance, etc.

• A water pump or sponge filter to facilitate water movement, unless you plan to do full water changes at least weekly

• Rocks or wide planters to act as land/"islands"

• A food dish (escape-proof is great to minimize the number of bugs that try to go swimming before they get eaten)

• Water conditioner like Seachem Prime or a reverse osmosis system to make tap water frog-safe

• Basic overhead lighting on a timer to provide a clear day/night cycle - an LED bulb or strip works great

• Staple diet food - live bugs sized appropriately for your frogs

Recommended supplies:

• Live plants for both the land and water portions of the enclosure. Lots of safe houseplants are content growing in water!

  • Some of our favorites are Ficus pumila/quercifolia and Strobilanthes sinuata, but most pothos, scindapsus, philodendron, monstera, syngonium, etc. root great in water and utilize excess nutrients well. Duckweed can be a pain, but less voracious floating plants (red-root floaters, salvinia, water lettuce, etc) are also great options and act as little frog-rafts.

• an aquarium siphon hose for cleaning and water changes (just a basic flexible tube)

• A turkey baster or similar for spot-cleaning waste from the tank

• Water quality test strips or kits for checking ammonia and nitrite levels.

What about substrate?

In the water: up to personal preference! Unless I really dial in a paludarium to reduce algae growth, I prefer a bare-bottom tank so I can easily scrape and remove algae buildup. But a sand or gravel substrate in the water works great! It might just be a pain to keep looking nice. It will look gorgeous for a month or two, and then... the algae humbles us all.

On land: up to personal preference! I use minimal loose substrate in the land areas because I don't love it tracking into their "pond" and continually filling up my filter. You can use something like coco fiber or peat moss, but honestly just a bed of sphagnum moss or some pieces of bark will do nicely! Most of the land we offer is in the form of stable smooth stones that breach the water surface. We also have elevated planted areas that are primarily live moss, plants, and drainage media. No surface dirt required!

What about water quality?

FBT are quite tolerant to variability in water quality, but you still want to ensure that it is dechlorinated and minimize buildup of toxic nitrogenous waste (ammonia and nitrites). You don't necessarily have to test your water the way you would for a freshwater tank (though you totally can and it'd be great to do) - simply doing full or partial water changes at least weekly is normally sufficient for keeping their water clean. If you feed more frequently than 2-3x/week, you'll probably need to clean more frequently.

If you are familiar with establishing a biological filter in freshwater tanks, treat FBT just like a low tech freshwater tank. Some good established beneficial bacteria + various plants to utilize nitrates will make water maintenance largely hands-off.

Water Source

Here at Telos, we use a combination of RO (reverse osmosis) filtered water, and treated tap water for our FBTs.

If you’re using tap water, I strongly recommend using a water conditioner product even if you let the tap water “sit” for several days to evaporate out chlorine. Many places use chloramine in municipal water treatment, which will not evaporate out, and there are lots of other substances in water (like metals) which can harm your frog - and a good water conditioner like Seachem Prime will neutralize and detoxify these in addition to dechlorinating the water.