Please help me decipher what’s going on with my African Dwarf frog

galacticfern

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Over the last few days she’s become very lethargic and bloated, and her eyes have turned a milky white color. There’ve been no changes to food, feeding schedule, or tank inhabitants (tank mates are endlers, cories, and a mystery snail, lots of plants). Water tests are all normal (8.2ph, 0ppm ammonia, 0ppm nitrite , 10-15ppm nitrate). I’ve had her for two years and she’s been happy and healthy until now. Is there something I can do about this, or do you think it’s just her time to go? Is there anything I can do to make her more comfortable?
 

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Sorry your critter is ailing. I have no help for you except to bump your thread a bit. My daughter has never been able to keep these things alive, despite having a well-kept tank with near perfect water. Not sure what we were doing wrong. Hope you get help.
 
Cloudy eyes are usually caused by something in the water irritating the frog. She seems to be retaining fluid in her body and that could be an internal problem.

You can try doing a 75% water change and gravel cleaning the substrate every day for a week and see if that helps.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

The pH is a bit high for them but if the pH has been the same all the time you have had the frog, then that is not the issue.

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Any idea what the GH (general hardness) and KH (carbonate hardness) of your water supply is?
This information can usually be obtained from your water supply company's website or by telephoning them. If they can't help you, take a glass full of tap water to the local pet shop and get them to test it for you. Write the results down (in numbers) when they do the tests. And ask them what the results are in (eg: ppm, dGH, or something else).

If the water is really hard, she might have kidney problems due to the high mineral content in the water.

That's about all I can offer. Hopefully a herpetologist will see this and be able to offer more advice.
 
Cloudy eyes are usually caused by something in the water irritating the frog. She seems to be retaining fluid in her body and that could be an internal problem.

You can try doing a 75% water change and gravel cleaning the substrate every day for a week and see if that helps.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

The pH is a bit high for them but if the pH has been the same all the time you have had the frog, then that is not the issue.

----------
Any idea what the GH (general hardness) and KH (carbonate hardness) of your water supply is?
This information can usually be obtained from your water supply company's website or by telephoning them. If they can't help you, take a glass full of tap water to the local pet shop and get them to test it for you. Write the results down (in numbers) when they do the tests. And ask them what the results are in (eg: ppm, dGH, or something else).

If the water is really hard, she might have kidney problems due to the high mineral content in the water.

That's about all I can offer. Hopefully a herpetologist will see this and be able to offer more advice.
Thank you SO much for the reply. I always dechlorinate my water, and the pH has been stable at 8.2 since I started the tank a few years ago. I’ll definitely try some big water changes this week. The average GH is quite high (180ppm) in my city, but I converted to a blackwater setup with lots of wood to help with that. I’m not sure of exactly how much it’s gone down though. Your suggestion of kidney problems is definitely plausible. KH is 55ppm. My other ADF is totally unaffected and this is really out of the blue so I’m really having a hard time trying to think of what this could be. Do you think it’s possible it’s a parasitic problem?
 
Sorry your critter is ailing. I have no help for you except to bump your thread a bit. My daughter has never been able to keep these things alive, despite having a well-kept tank with near perfect water. Not sure what we were doing wrong. Hope you get help.
Thank you so much, I really appreciate it. Everything has been totally stable so I’m going crazy trying to figure out what’s going on with her.
 
It's not parasitic.

It could be an internal bacterial infection. Unfortunately you can't use most medications on frogs because it tends to kill them, and if it is internal organ problems, there's not much you can do except provide clean conditions, cross your fingers and hope for the best.
 
It's not parasitic.

It could be an internal bacterial infection. Unfortunately you can't use most medications on frogs because it tends to kill them, and if it is internal organ problems, there's not much you can do except provide clean conditions, cross your fingers and hope for the best.
Thanks so much. I thought about trying to drain the fluid with a syringe to make her more comfortable but I’m wary about hurting her if I do anything incorrectly. I’ll check back in if anything changes.
 

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