Help! Sick/injured toad

So I found a toad that was super skinny, missing an eye and had a deformed jaw. I took him back home with me and I have been feeding him wet cat food because I don’t have access to bugs at the moment, but I’m going to try to take care of him even though he probably won’t make it😢



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Oh that poor little sweet baby! If he is eating he may surprise you and hang on for a while. Cat food is high caloric so imho it won’t hurt him if he is skinny. No wonder he’s is so sickly if he is missing an eye and has a deformed jaw! That’s very sweet of you to take him in and show him some kindness! Good for you! :+1::smiling_face_with_three_hearts::frog:

Keep us posted!

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Yeah I hope so, I have to shove it far enough in his mouth where he can’t spit it out and then usually he swallows it but sometimes I have to help him swallow too.

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Well if he can’t or doesn’t want to eat insects when you get them then you may have to do the only humane thing possible and that is to have him euthanized because he is probably suffering……. :pray:

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Yeah… you’re right

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His jaw almost looks to me like he was born that way or grew that way. So he could have congenital deformities and/or he could have suffered major malnutrition, especially if he was deformed and had trouble hunting for food.

Definitely stop feeding him cat food, it will make him sick if fed regularly. Instead, you can give him Repashy’s ‘Grub Pie’ mixed with water via an oral syringe (no needle). That way he will get the nutrients appropriate for an insectivore. You can also do freeze-dried insects, though I would soak them in water to add some moisture.

Good insects to offer:

  • black soldier fly larvae
  • small-ish silkworms
  • small hornworms
  • blue bottle fly spikes

Other options:

  • crickets that are gutloaded, do not leave uneaten crickets loose in tank, they might harm the toad
  • dubia roaches (small), gutloaded
  • maybe small mealworms if desperate

Avoid feeding wild-caught insects for now if you can. Don’t feed pink mice or wax worms, they are REALLY bad for anurans long term.

If you feed live insects, make sure you dust with calcium & vitamins, especially as you’re nursing him to health. If you are feeding Grub Pie in a slurry, don’t worry about supplementation at the moment. He may even grow to accept cooked Grub Pie via tongs.

Make sure he has access to a bowl of water he can sit in to get hydrated. I don’t know what species he is, but it’s a good idea for anurans in general. Hopefully we can get a species ID from someone on the forum :crossed_fingers:t4: That would help give us more info on appropriate husbandry.

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Ok! Thank you for the advice

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I am confused…you found this guy out in the wild? If so, I get wanting to help it, but it is also crucial to let nature take its course. If this guy was meant to die and become food for something else, then it is best to let that happen. If you have other animals and he is actually sick, it is also a bad plan to bring it into your home and risk the health of your other pets.

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I think whether it is the right or wrong thing to do is definitely going to be a matter of subjective, individual perspective. ‘The wild’ is a nebulous concept. I see nothing unethical with choosing to (in legal contexts with plentiful species) keep a single, deformed/ailing animal as a personal pet. If the animal remains in captivity and is not bred, the impact seems minimal. It’s even less impact than keeping a healthy WC animal.

I would likely keep the toad myself, in this situation. It just warrants a lot of caution when it comes to quarantine & veterinary treatment of a WC animal.

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So I checked his enclosure And he escaped🙁 we live in a really rural area and we are surrounded by forest. We leave the back door open most days if the weather is nice, so I think he must’ve hopped out the back door and into the woods. Maybe it was meant to be but anyways, I guess nature will take its course now

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Probably for the best. But you can rest in the knowledge that you tried to do the best you could for him. He was in a foreign place in your home so he went back to where he needed to be. The forest is his home where he belongs…… :+1:

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