Gut Load

[BigPlaya]

K well I am trying a new thing for cricket food. When I buy some certain gutloads, they always smell like dog food. So..... Im now feeding them crushed dogfood. If its good enough for a dog it must be alright for crickets. They sound so happy that it cant be that bad.

[maiden_canada]

use oranges and fruit and stuff like that, never heard of dogfood but im guessing it isn't good. remember what goes into the cricket stays in the cricket, and goes into your lizard

[Oliverian]

I fed mine crushed dog food (when I bred crickets) They went nuts for it, and chowed down right away. I wouldn't say it's bad for them, but I don't know for sure. Mine all died, by the way, but it was most likely do to being crowded in a container that wasn't quite big enough. They started killing each other. No harm in trying, eh? If you DO notice problems with the dog food, just switch back! :)
-TammyR

[Dani33]

I have actually had good results with dog food. My pups are on a high quality diet. So, I always have it around. I have had a lower mortality rate using it too. I alway provide fresh fruits and veggies too. I prefer to use fruits and veggies for water instead of cotton in water or the gel stuff etc. Allot of people use potatoes, but I don't think that there is anything nutritious in it. This is what has worked best for me.

[BigPlaya]

They seem to like it. And the good thing about it is that you dont have to pay 8 bucks for a little container full. Maybe I'll add some carrot or something.

[Wuntu Menny]

Bigplaya--- UFA

I use poultry finisher ground down and supplemented to accomodate the crix. I've been using it for years and it costs the same for 50 lbs as gutload does for less than a kg !! Ordering 4000 - 10,000 crix per month, my mortallty rates are less than 10%.

WM

[BigPlaya]

Poultry finisher?????

[Wuntu Menny]

Its chicken feed that is drug and hormone free designed to purge their bodies of crap before they go to slaughter. Not to be confused with poultry starter or maintenance formulas that contain a myriad of synthesized garbage to enhance growth and "carcass performance".

If you poll the other keepers here, you'll find even better recipes for crick diets. Some people treat their crix better than their own relatives around here!

WM

[sevenofthorns]

Dog food is commonly used by various zoos who have to gutload lots of insects. A slice of orange and some dogfood would gutload them well, provided it isn't a cheap end dog food.

As for chicken feeds, another one in addition to the finisher is the layer mash, which is intended to be fed to chickens laying eggs for human consumption and by law can't have any of the additives in it.

Cricket diet is the most important thing to keeping them alive, with space and cleaness being the next too, so it's worth taking the time to find something that works best for you.

Rob

[eyespy]

Those purgatives used for poultry are not the best idea for gutloading. We feed our bugs lots of things that are non-nutritive for insects but good for our herps. Many of those vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals are never incorporated into the feeder's body, it's the feces that contain the nutrients. Anything that has laxative qualities literally makes the bugs poop out the nutrition we are trying to get into our herps.

[Yanis]

I feed my cricket with many vegetables(carrot,salad,tomatoes...),bird seed,fish, dog and cat food and also special cricket food that we found in many pet shop.All my crickets are dusted with vitamin D3 and calcium powder before giving to eat to my lizards