What do you feed your tegus?

Grimlock · Honored Member Joined: Mar 03, 2006 Posts: 213

Grim gets ground turkey w/fruit, or fruit and crickets every day except weekends when he has rodents. He...er actually I should probably be saying she, isn't picky at all and tries everything. She eats fruit on its own which is great, especially loves grapes and mango but likes every kind of fruit I've tried so far, even apples which surprised me given their texture. Kiwi is the only thing she has ignored so far. I used to give scrambled egg but am stopping until I can find fertilized eggs, so she doesn't get that biotin deficiancy thing. I've also given her high quality (canidae) dry dog food that I soaked until it was mushy, she loved it but I won't give that very often.
I decided not to bother with the scorpions...
I've been letting her out of her cage to eat so she isn't aggressive about it...to my hands...but bare or white socked feet will get her all excited...she even grabbed my pants leg and gave it a shake once

bubblz · Posted: Sun May 28, 2006 7:27 pm Post subject:

My columbian,.. Spaz eats the usual hoppers, ground turkey, mealworms, and crickets. But she also likes peaches, pineapples, oranges, bananas, mixed vegetables, brine shrimp, river shrimp, krill, grasshoppers, chicken, crab, beetles and silkworm cocoons (for some reason she would only eat half and go to the next one). One day she smelled the smoked sausages I was cooking and started pacing and scratching to get out, I gave her some and she started huffin, puffin and chased me down to get some more

. That's the only time I have ever seen a really strong feeding response from her

.

jb · Honored Member Joined: Sep 01, 2005 Posts: 201

My Columbian eats prekilled small mice, turkey burger, eggs (rarely offered). He will take mangos and bananas if they are very ripe and he hasn't had a rodent in a day or two. He gets Zophobas worms "supers" also. He's not interested in crickets anymore. I supplement with Minerall.

stlmetalhead · Posted: Tue Jun 06, 2006 8:27 pm Post subject:

My columbian eats mice, small chicks, eggs(cooked and raw), turkey, chicken, venison(deer meat, i've found it to be very good it's really lean almost no fat content and lots of protein), grapes, bannanas, strawberries, blueberries, rasberries, and once in a while some avacado.
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-0.0.1 praying mantis
-0.1 leapord gecko
-0.1 3 toed box turtle

Johelian · Retired Mod Joined: Nov 22, 2004 Posts: 848

I would be a bit wary of avocado; its believed to have caused anaphylactic shock in birds, which would immediately make me unwilling to offer it to lizards. It may be that the toxins are contained in the plant and seed pit rather than the flesh, but its something to consider I think.

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1.0.0 Argentine Tegu T.merianae
3.4.0 Monkey Tailed Skink C.zebrata
1.0.0 Crawl Cay Boa B.c.imperator
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agallegos37 · Posted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 2:34 pm Post subject:

Hey what's your guys' opinion on fish? How would that be for food?

tegulevi · Respected Member Joined: Mar 10, 2005 Posts: 489

I have been told that certain kinds of fish are better. Like you dont want to feed many bottomfeeding fish like catfish. a cleaner species would be good though like trout or something

Nozo · Member Joined: May 16, 2006 Posts: 34 Location: LA, CA

i feed my 3 mounth old arg cat food babyfood(good way 2 get them 2 eat vegs)turkey chicken crikets

Kilioa · Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 3:45 pm Post subject:

tegu monitor diet, ground beef, pinkies fuzzies rat pups rats hamsters . . carrots, string beans cucumber lettuce (not iceberg), mangos, peaches, bannannas (like crack heads like crack) plums, grapes, apples (less acidic), crickets, superworms, hornworms (ate a huge grasshopper once) . . . etc (no problems with any of these loves stew (cut up some rat pups (1 pup=small - 3 ratpups = adult) and mix fruits vegies with a little tegu diet for weight and sprinkle some vitamins for good measure . . . . . i call it fetus stew for whatever reason
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1.0.0 Blue Tegu (Jaeger)
0.1.0 Colombian Black & White Tegu (Kilioa)
1.0.0 Red Tegu (Odin)
2.3.0 Black Emperor Scorpions
1.0.0 Ball Python (Lucifer)
1.1.0 Fat Tail Geckos
0.1.0 White Lined Gecko

Daggit_Columbian · Honored Member Joined: Oct 10, 2006 Posts: 251

tupinambis · Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 4:56 pm Post subject:

Grimlock - the biotin deficiency thing in eggs is a bit of a misnomer, I'm not exactly sure how the "fertilized" egg bit got started but I haven't been able to find anything that supports that. What is known, however, is that in uncooked hens eggs, the egg white contains a fair amount of avidin. Avidin is a protein compound that has very high affinity (strongly binds) for biotin and cannot be absorbed by the intestine, hence leading to the biotin deficiency by preventing biotin uptake. Biotin is present in fair quantities in the egg yolk, however. Cooking the egg supposedly denatures (so that it is no longer functional) the avidin but not the biotin. So you could either cook the eggs, or avoid giving the egg white. It usually takes a long time of constant raw egg ingestion to create a biotin deficiency. Interestingly, it has been shown in other organisms that those with a higher vegetable content in their diet have higher biotin absorption rates than those with higher meat content in their diets. This might be the basis of a lot of the skin problems in Tupinambis rufescens (as opposed to vit.C as many believe) because biotin deficiencies frequently present themselves as dermatological disorders.