New Crestie Questions

[robcan]

I recently purchased a juvenile dalmation crestie. How do you guys go about feedings?

1. When feeding baby food, WER mixture, etc. do you simply put it in a dish and let the gecko find it? Or do you feed him outside of the cage in another container so he can more easily find the food. My gecko looks lost in his cage and I worry that he is having trouble finding the food, but it would be hard to feed him in an outside container because he sleeps until its "lights out."

2. Same question for crickets. Can a juvenile find a cricket or crickets in a 20g tall tank? Or should I be feeding crickets in an outside container as well? Thanks for your replies.

Robert

[Ptindy]

Hey Rob, in a 20 gallon the juvenile should have no problems finding crickets. Baby food could be a different story, but I doubt it. I usually place my baby food in the plants or on the branches in the dish if I can find a sturdy enough spot. When I am in a rush however I just drop them in and most if not all cresteds do find their baby food. I wouldn't worry about either, especially crickets. Lights out for 10 or 12 hours, you crested will definately find what it is looking for.

Mike

[DragnDrop]

I've never had a crestie starve because he couldn't find his food. I put the dish on the floor (actually it's in a stand on the floor). They'll find what they're looking for. Wild ones don't get hand fed nor do they have room service to their door, yet they manage.

For a while I had a 65 gallon tank for crestie kids, aged from about 8-12 weeks. Tons of pothos growing in there made it nearly impossible to find anything, let alone a small crestie. I put 10 cresties in, then added crickets, water and fruit mix on schedule. Some of them were to be holdbacks so I wanted them to grow big enough to sex. About 6 or 7 months later, I took out 10 sub-adult cresties that looked just as good as the ones who grew up in smaller tanks and were hand fed once in a while. Wild cresties go looking for food, that instinct is still with our captives.