power feeding

[infernalis]

I give them to him all the time, they are cheap, full of protein, and one of the things they eat in nature, African worms are so much larger than "Canadian Night Crawlers" but are the same "meat", so my feelings are since they are natural food that Savs eat in the wild, I use it in his normal diet.

Look at this African version of a night crawler.

Originally Posted by jay0133

Yuck canned, full of preservatives!! That cant be good.

And salt, excessive salt is lethal to any reptile, Tuna also contains Thiaminase, an enzyme that blocks thiamine absorption, that leads to liver failure.

Goldfish, Rosy reds and comet fish are all full of this lethal enzyme, never feed those common feeder fish to any reptile that will consume fish, the results are not immediate, it can take years, but when the liver shuts down, they suffer a slow painful death.

[Jenn_06]

ok taking about fish can they eat catfish or other lake/river fish? i feed Jojo a little catfish last year and he loved it.

[shaunyboy]

Originally Posted by jay0133

Yuck canned, full of preservatives!! That cant be good. Can earthworms be fed as a weekly treat or monthly

pregnant women are advised AGAINST eating tuna due to high mercury content/contamination

i'm thinking this is what played a part in the lady's lizard dieng at 2 years of age also if it was only tuna being fed it surely would not have got all its required nourishment from tuna alone ?

sorry i'm not too clued up on lizards folks

cheers shaun

[Jay]

OMG look at the size of that worm. One of those equals a dozen of ours lol

[shaunyboy]

Originally Posted by jay0133

OMG look at the size of that worm. One of those equals a dozen of ours lol

wonder how big the fish would be you caught if that worm was your bait

[infernalis]

Originally Posted by Jenn_06

ok taking about fish can they eat catfish or other lake/river fish? i feed Jojo a little catfish last year and he loved it.

Bullhead, catfish, Carp, Fathead minnow, Gizzard Shad, Spottail Shiner, Common White Sucker, Lake Whitefish, Buffalofish & Bream all contain Thiaminase

I personally prefer to stick with - Trout, rock bass, calico bass, sunfish, Chubs and guppies, all fish that are reported to be safe reptile food.

Another thing to take into consideration is the quality of the water the fish came from, many waterways are polluted or contain trace pollutants that can be detrimental to your pet's health.

google the word Thiaminase, there are many articles about it's effect on reptiles.

thiaminase in fish - Google Search


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[stephanbakir]

Scary, The only fish i feed to my reptiles are guppies lake trout and speckled trout.

[infernalis]

All superb choices.

My garter snakes love rainbow trout. so don't Chomper.

[Jenn_06]

ok thats we have a lake next to the house with tons of sunfish and its a very clean lake.

[Millinex]

I'm not trying to step on toes by bringing this up, but what the OP said was partially correct. Naturally these monitors as they are young are perfect prey for many animals, and many get eaten. It is programmed within them to eat, eat, eat and get to an almost adult size very fast.

I know sidbarvin had his 2 nile monitors at over 5 feet within the first year, 24/7 lighting and feeding as much as they wanted. I would also say his niles are probably the healthiest captive adult monitors I have seen online, and I believe his 2 original males at 4-5 years old are well over 7 foot long now.

If temps/humidity/substrate is maintained, feeding large volumes is very beneficial in my eyes. However, when the former requirements are not kept properly, it leads to health problems, poor growth, and an obese animal.

I'm not going to lie, every time someone tells me their 16" sav is a year old, I almost throw up, as a sav should be almost 3 feet or 3 feet within it's first year.

-Mike

[Reptile_Reptile]

thats a pretty big growth spurt. btw how did you learn thread necromancy?

[Millinex]

The thread is like 2-3 weeks old.. that's not thread necromancy lol.

[NennaMeerkat]

See now I have a question having this thread brought back from the dead and food being an issue on this thread in general. I don't own and large lizards and don't plan on it. However when I worked at a zoo we had a big older savannah monitor and we were instructed to feed it baby chickens or slightly older chickens. The lizard LOVED them but I don't know how healthy of a diet on just them was for him.

He was a rescue from a home that didn't give him proper care. He didn't move well, I think due to bad bones, and because of that was a total slouch in general. I don't remember if he was overweight since he was my first and only adult I have ever seen in person and dealt with.

[infernalis]

Avians in general are poor food items for reptiles.

[Millinex]

As a staple diet, chicks are awful, however, I do occasionally feed them out to my herps as a variety/treat item.

-Mike