Well it's been a week and the tadpoles seem to be very fat and happy. They love the nasty boiled lettuce and I stuck a bunch of my floating plants in the tank and a small rock with algea on it. I also have a strange looking water bug and a couple of baby salamanderes which look a lot like the tadpoles just skinnier and they have a little fan around their gills. also now have several baby fish... My fish spawned and I didn't realize it and stuck the pond plants in there.. I was down looking in the side of the pond and saw all the babies in it so I know they weren't some out of the same pond as the tadpoles. My hubby thinks I'm nuts with my obsession with the fish/frogs/etc. Just can't help myself.

curleelocks, "rather large tadpoles", could mean either Bullfrogs or Green frogs [or depending on where you reside, Cane toads, which is not good]. Both Bullfrog and Green frog tadpoles can take up to two [or three]years to change into frogs. The tadpoles, whatever type they are,will survive quite well in that unfiltered pond. But there is nothing to stop you from staring up the filtering system. Be sure they cannot be sucked into the pump, by having a screen over the intake side. Since they mostly eat algae and decomposing plant matter, they will have lots to eat in there. You could carry on using the mosquito dunks, as they are supposed to be harmless to tadpoles, etc. Check on the dunk package wrapper to be sure. I would suggest you "Google search" Bullfrogs and/or Green frogs for more information on them. The Bullfrog tends to eat [or tries to eat] everything that moves, including other frogs, birds, fish etc. Personally, I rather have Green frogs around my pond than Bullfrogs, though they too will eat smaller frogs. Bullfrogs, to me, are just a bit too aggresive toward other small creatures, and have desimated the other populations of other types frogs, wherever they settled or have been introduced to, by humans. "Horton"

I gathered tons of tadpoles at a local pond and have been raising them in an open fish tank in the back yard and I noticed that the first one to turn into a from hung around for a couple days then climbed out and hopped away.. we have brought many frogs home too and we never see them except in mating season.

They may be leucistic if they are pure white with dark eyes, or if they are just lighter than the others they are probably just a different species. There aren't too many frog species that have tadpoles that take two summers to develop so it's most likely a True (Rana) Frog (Green Bull, Leopard, etc.). If you could post a picture, or if you don't have a good enough camera, put one on your scanner and just scan it. The other option of course would just be to scoop up a few and keep them in a fish tank until they change. Keep us up to date. Check out these links and identify what type of tadpole they are. Then go from there. http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/tadpole/division_3.htm http://www.trentu.ca/biology/tadpole/Webidentify.htm http://bio.fsu.edu/~gunz/tadpolepage.html#hylidae Dave