Livefood lowdown

Feeding time SUPPLEMENTS

You’ll need to think about supplementation well in advance of feeding time to ensure you have the right products at your disposal. Most animals will benefit from a vitamin and mineral supplement, invariably containing calcium, and likely a vitamin D3 component too. Some species even benefit from nectar supplementation. You’ll find that there’s a staggering array of supplement products on the market, each servicing husbandry or species-specific needs. To do the topic justice would need an article of its own, so be sure to research your animal’s specific needs.

Most supplements come in the form of a powder and can be applied to the livefood by putting both bugs and supplement in a plastic bag and shaking them together until they are coated. There’s also a range of bug-dusting and feeding tools available, so it’s worth asking about these when you’re next in store.

Housekeeping

Be sure to only provide as much food as your animal can eat in a sitting. It’s worth counting how many bugs you feed at each session and varying the number offered accordingly. If your animal eats them all within a couple of hours, offer a few more next time. If they leave some running around the enclosure, offer fewer. It’s also important to remove any uneaten bugs. Some people say this should be done after 30 minutes, some say you can wait a few hours before doing so, but removing them is a must regardless.

It’s important for two reasons. Firstly, hungry bugs can and often will attack your animal. Quite severe injuries and even deaths have been recorded where uneaten livefood prey has attacked pet animals which were supposed to eat them, and lesser injuries are relatively common.

Secondly, you’ll remember that the vast majority of an invertebrate’s diet is moisture. A hungry bug will chow down on whatever moist substance is available to them, and in a reptile enclosure that’s often going to be reptile poo. Leaving livefood uneaten in your animal’s enclosure for extended periods means you’ll likely be gut-loading it with poo, rather than good, nutritious food. Not good!

Moderation

Feeding time is one of the most fascinating aspects of animal keeping, and livefood being stalked, captured and devoured is particularly enthralling to watch – if a little gruesome at times. However, there’s a health issue which many reptiles, amphibians and exotic pets suffer from which is rarely discussed, and it’s a problem that’s becoming increasingly common. I’m talking about obesity. Fat lizards might look cute, but the health risks associated with this condition are just as serious for pets as they are for humans. It’s worth remembering that we, as keepers, are entirely responsible for the health and wellbeing of our pets and have the power to moderate the volume and type of food we provide. Obesity simply does not occur with these animals in the wild.

The Spice Of Life

Finally, no conversation about livefood and feeding would be complete without mentioning the importance of variety. In the wild animals would eat an enormous variety of different foods, and it is our responsibility to try to emulate this as closely as possible. Feeding just crickets or just locusts isn’t ideal, especially as there are so many alternative choices available. There’s simply no excuse for not mixing it up a little.

What’s on the menu?

The selection of livefood options available today is amazing. Knowing what they’re good for, how to use them and what benefits they provide for your animal will make all the difference, from improved nutrition and health to better welfare and increased enrichment opportunities. Know your bugs and mix up the menu at feeding time.

Check out the guide on the following pages to find out all you need to know.