# Gut loading crickets



## natsuko (Jan 3, 2009)

I was just wondering what you guys used to do yours? I've been trying to give mine various foods, carrots, cabbage, grass, mushroom and today apple and pear baby food. Is this ok? I've been removing it each day and replacing with fresh foods as well as water on cotton wool.


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## Luke87 (Dec 31, 2008)

Dont give them grass from outside. I give mine tomatoe, grapes, cucumber... anything thats got plenty of liquid in aswell and easy for em to munch on!

Dont forget to dust them with calcium before feeding to your leo!

Luke


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## natsuko (Jan 3, 2009)

Why cant you feed them grass from outside? I have been dusting forgot to on first night but have been since. Is it calcium every day except for the one day you do the vitamin one?


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## Luke87 (Dec 31, 2008)

i never use anything from the garden to feed my crix/lizard! never know whats been sprayed, cats wee/pooh been there... list goes on just better safe than sorry like!

Luke


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## Luke87 (Dec 31, 2008)

for my beardie i do calcium mon-fri and the other sat-sun


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## MrMike (Jun 28, 2008)

We don't have crickets, but we use a mix of leafy veg, butternut squash and fish food as a staple gutload for our insects.
Typical dusting regime is calcium weekdays, Multivit weekends : victory:


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## natsuko (Jan 3, 2009)

thank you. Surely though cat wee cant be as bad as pesticides and other chemicals that have been put on the fruit/veg we eat ourselves.


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## Luke87 (Dec 31, 2008)

was an example... i would rather not give my herp crix that have eaten cat pee but thats upto u! :lol2:


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## natsuko (Jan 3, 2009)

:lol2: can always wash it....


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## dnacars (Jul 15, 2011)

I use fish food and dried dog food they love it. And I powder them as well before feeding. Now I have been told not to use dog food is this right.???:whistling2:


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

cruched dog food is fine


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## trudib (Jul 24, 2011)

Mine get pro grub and fresh veg everyday, cabbage, carrot, potatoes etc, might have to try fish food as always got that in


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## dnacars (Jul 15, 2011)

Just looked on the packet and looks very good to me.
Wheat
Meat meal
Wheat feed
Digest
Poultry fat
Linseed
Beet bull
Peas
Maize
Lucerne
Minerals
Yeast
Citrus extract
Yucca extract
Vitamin 
A
D3
E
C
E1
Iron
E2
Calcium iodate
E4
E5
E6
E8
Protein
Crude fibre
Ash
Omega 6
Omega 3
Now I think that any cricket eating that with exo terra multi vitamin and there calcium d3 powder all over them is spot on.
What I will do now is look at the cricket food that you can buy and see what is in that, as the dog food that I get is £9.99 for 20kg


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

Crickets don't need extra water if your giving them plenty of veg. Grass is good as food, dandelions even better. Just use common sense, collect where spraying is very unlikey and wash under runner water.

There is plenty of protein in the crickets already. So I don't use dogfoods. I give my insects veg only diets for 24-48 hours to increase the min/vit content on the insect. if you are using dog food which already has plenty of added vits like D3 how do you know how much powder to dust the crickets with ? 

I have hundreds of healthy baby lizards from eggs with very high hatch rates using this method of feeding the adults.


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

many people feed dog food because crickets like a high protein diet, 
and thats the whole point, the more vitamins ect in the crickets the less you need to dust, 
i almost never dust with vitamins i just rely on very high nutrition insects


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

123dragon said:


> many people feed dog food because crickets like a high protein diet,
> and thats the whole point, the more vitamins ect in the crickets the less you need to dust,
> i almost never dust with vitamins i just rely on very high nutrition insects


Yes crickets like a high protein diet, and children often like pizza, chips, fizzy drinks and chocolate.

There is a big difference between a maintenance diet, and the gutloading diet used for the last day or two before crickets (and other insects) are used. In my experience crickets will happily eat plenty of veg given the opertunity. Especially silent and black crickets

Vitamins in dog food is designed for dogs, and reptile vitamins are designed to suit reptiles. 

I also vitually never give my reptiles multivitamin powders. I last used some 6 months ago.


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

Blaptica said:


> Yes crickets like a high protein diet, and children often like pizza, chips, fizzy drinks and chocolate.
> 
> There is a big difference between a maintenance diet, and the gutloading diet used for the last day or two before crickets (and other insects) are used. In my experience crickets will happily eat plenty of veg given the opertunity. Especially silent and black crickets
> 
> ...


 yes but high protein diet is good for crickets,
and i dont have any difference between what they normally have day to day and what they have the day before being used, 
plus having a dry diet is easy to keep fresh all the time, salad and stuff needs to be replaced every day to keep the tub clean


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

123dragon said:


> yes but high protein diet is good for crickets,
> and i dont have any difference between what they normally have day to day and what they have the day before being used,
> plus having a dry diet is easy to keep fresh all the time, salad and stuff needs to be replaced every day to keep the tub clean


Do you know what gut loading is ? It is not about what the crickets like to eat, or what it good for the crickets. It is about providing the optimum nutrition for your reptile. If all you care about what is convenient for you, or have a problem with having to put in fresh good food for your crickets once a day then fine that is up to you. But in my view that is not necessarily the best way to feed your reptiles.

If convenience is all you care about maybe get yourself a plastic lizard then you won't need to feed it crickets at all.


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

not saying your wrong but i know most people on the forum feed a high protein dry diet for crickets, 
my insects eat at least 3 different veg and salad types a day cause my beardie wont eat anything but rocket but they still love eating dry food which is packed with vitamins ect


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## dnacars (Jul 15, 2011)

Blaptica said:


> Do you know what gut loading is ? It is not about what the crickets like to eat, or what it good for the crickets. It is about providing the optimum nutrition for your reptile. If all you care about what is convenient for you, or have a problem with having to put in fresh good food for your crickets once a day then fine that is up to you. But in my view that is not necessarily the best way to feed your reptiles.
> 
> If convenience is all you care about maybe get yourself a plastic lizard then you won't need to feed it crickets at all.


Yes I do understand what gut loading is and I am thinking of the reptile or amphibian that you keep and what is best for their care.

Now people that say they give their crickets fresh fruit and veg as well, some bad news as I have been looking into this. Here is a web site that you can check that shows you what vitamins and minerals that you get from each veg and fruit.

http://www.healthalternatives2000.com/meat-protein-nutrition-chart.html

your reptile or amphibians needs a lot more than just vitamins and minerals it needs protein. Lots of them need more than just the vitamins and minerals that the fruit and veg can supply. As you can see by the list that I have put up, for instance, which fruit and veg and make omega? They don’t, now your reptile and amphibian may do well on this but they are not getting the best that you can give them. That is why I give my crickets dried dog food and then cover them in multi vitamins and calcium powder before feeding them to my reptiles and amphibians, so they have the best that I can give them in a balanced diet.

And yes the web site is for humans but it shows you what is in them. If you look at the top it shows you what is in fruit, veg, meats and so on.
(You cannot overdo vitamins and minerals as your reptile and amphibian will just take what it needs and poo the rest out!)


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

dnacars said:


> Yes I do understand what gut loading is and I am thinking of the reptile or amphibian that you keep and what is best for their care.
> 
> Now people that say they give their crickets fresh fruit and veg as well, some bad news as I have been looking into this. Here is a web site that you can check that shows you what vitamins and minerals that you get from each veg and fruit.
> 
> ...


Have you ever heard of a reptile suffering from a protein defiency ? maybe they should add protein powder to the vitamin mix we put on crickets ?

Where is the best source of omega oils ? Oily fresh water fish. I am not sure that would feature very highly in the diet of the wild insects a bearded dragon eats (or for many other reptiles). There are are plant sources of omega oils for example in rape seed, linseed and hemp seed but again unlikely to be consumed by insects in great quantities. It makes you wonder how reptiles ever survive in the wild without their feeder insects being fed dog food ? 

But there are omega oils in grass ! Most insects in the wild will be eating green plant matter more than cereals or meat. Insects are very high in calcium that is why I gutload my insects with veg not cereals/meat. 

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that *you can* overdose on vitamins. Vitamin A for example can interfere with calcium absorption.


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

123dragon said:


> not saying your wrong but i know most people on the forum feed a high protein dry diet for crickets,
> my insects eat at least 3 different veg and salad types a day cause my beardie wont eat anything but rocket but they still love eating dry food which is packed with vitamins ect


I use a high protein diet for my insects too for maintenance/ growth but not for gutloading.


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## dnacars (Jul 15, 2011)

I'm not saying that wild insects eat dog food. What I am saying is just dog food has more vits and mins in it and the more you can get in to your pet the better. I would feed them bricks if they contained the same amount of vits and mins.

I do under stand what you are saying but in the wild they don't just eat one type of insect and plant. So they get what they need.

So as I have said I try to get the most into my pets and it doesn't mater which way you do it as long as they get what they need.


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

Blaptica said:


> Have you ever heard of a reptile suffering from a protein defiency ? maybe they should add protein powder to the vitamin mix we put on crickets ?
> 
> Where is the best source of omega oils ? Oily fresh water fish. I am not sure that would feature very highly in the diet of the wild insects a bearded dragon eats (or for many other reptiles). There are are plant sources of omega oils for example in rape seed, linseed and hemp seed but again unlikely to be consumed by insects in great quantities. It makes you wonder how reptiles ever survive in the wild without their feeder insects being fed dog food ?
> 
> ...


many kinds of crickets in the wild supplement their diet with dead insects ect to get the proteins that help them grow well,


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## 123dragon (Jan 15, 2011)

Blaptica said:


> I use a high protein diet for my insects too for maintenance/ growth but not for gutloading.


all my insects are together so they get dry maintenance diet plus plenty of salad 
when i have a group of small crickets they the are fed a diet that is like 90% fish food


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

123dragon said:


> many kinds of crickets in the wild supplement their diet with dead insects ect to get the proteins that help them grow well,


Sure thats true. But have you noticed the biggest component of that dog food quoted is wheat ! Most insects that lizards eat will be full of plant food, not wheat or 'meat meal'. Most people seem to think plants do not contain protein too, but they do.

Insects that are commercially available tend to be ones that are easily cultured on cheap foods like cereals and potatoes. Mealworms are the obvious examples. Locusts the exception.


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

dnacars said:


> I'm not saying that wild insects eat dog food. What I am saying is just dog food has more vits and mins in it and the more you can get in to your pet the better. I would feed them bricks if they contained the same amount of vits and mins.
> 
> I do under stand what you are saying but in the wild they don't just eat one type of insect and plant. So they get what they need.
> 
> So as I have said I try to get the most into my pets and it doesn't mater which way you do it as long as they get what they need.


I would be a fool if I only used one plant for gutloading, but I vary it alot. 

Do you take multivitamins tablets everyday yourself ? If not why not ? Using your logic it would be best to take a bottle of pills a day not a single pill. Many vitamins are toxic when over consumed. Many rat poisons are made from a vitamin we need in small doses we need to be healthy.


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## Blaptica (Jun 26, 2008)

123dragon said:


> all my insects are together so they get dry maintenance diet plus plenty of salad
> when i have a group of small crickets they the are fed a diet that is like 90% fish food


Please continue doing this.


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