Last updated 4 March 2003: corrected link to Rodents

FOOD FOR REPTILES AND AMPHIBIANS

What to put on the menu for your lizards, snakes, salamanders, tortoises, frogs and other cold-blooded terrestrial vertebrates


Introduction

Feeding cold-blooded creatures is a bit different from feeding cats, dogs, rabbits or rodents. For one thing cold-blooded terrestrial vertebrates generally eat much less than their warm-blooded counterparts as they don't depend upon food to supply their body heat. The second important thing to note is that a lot of them need live food, ie animal prey of some sort that is preferably moving at the time it is fed to them. Whereas cats and dogs are carnivorous, the food that you fork out of a tin for Tiddles or Fido was killed and prepared long ago in a factory somewhere. Lizards, frogs and salamanders normally need to kill their food themselves: offering a plate of dead insects would normally meet with complete disinterest. As you might expect, it's a bit more challenging to get a box of live crickets to the intended recipient than to dole out dried food into a bowl.

Since I have been keeping reptiles for a few years I have experimented with different forms of live food and how best to prepare it. What follows is a series of steps that I have found useful, and which may work for you. Hopefully it will at least give you some pointers.

Crickets

Mealworms and king mealworms

Waxworms

Earthworms

Rodents and other mammals

More food items to be added ....

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