Dog Food

Rottncorpse · Member Joined: Jan 03, 2005 Posts: 55 Location: TN

Is it true that dog food can harm tegus ? everyone that I have talked too (1 being a respected reptile breeder) says that good high protein dog food is a good supplement to there normal diet

beardiedragon · Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2005 11:42 pm Post subject:

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

NO dogfood unless your tegu barks. too high in fat, not designed for reptiles.
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Bennett

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Rick · Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2005 11:42 pm Post subject:

I don't feed my tegus dog food. I can think of more nutritional foods that I would rather feed my tegu. I generally stick to natural whole foods (mice, bugs, etc), but as far as making your tegu sick, I don't know.

There is no one I trust more for captive bred tegu information than Bert at Agama International and on his website he talks about a pet tegu he had before he started breeding. He states, "Her varied diet was also a surprise to me. I knew that she would eat meat, eggs, bugs, mice and such, but I learned that she also liked fruit, vegetables (cooked and raw), dog or cat food, melted ice cream, and even bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches. There were very few normal people foods that she wouldn't eat."

From that I would base the opinion that I wouldn't feed my tegu a strict diet of dogfood, but the very occasional bit of kibble probably wouldn't hurt.

Rick
theTegu.com

labl3d · Member Joined: Dec 27, 2004 Posts: 14 Location: Cali

From working at a petstore I have learned that many canned dogfoods are indeed high in the bad varieties of fats(yes, there are different types) and "loaded with bacteria". I will look into getting more information on bacteria in canned dog food, but as of right now I have talked to several dogfood rep's that aknowledge the fact that there is quite a bit of bacteria in "wet food". Personally I would stay far away from anything thats is questionable. I would argue that any animal protien that can be found in dogfood cannot compare to a fresh rat. IMO I could never consider dogfood as a "supplement". If your "respected reptile breeder" is correct you still wont gain that much from it, if hes wrong it could potentially really hurt your animal. Stay far, far away.

Just my $.02,
Troy
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Rottncorpse · Member Joined: Jan 03, 2005 Posts: 55 Location: TN

what types of meat can I replace it with, I see people say ground turkey(raw or cooked).

beardiedragon · Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2005 10:10 am Post subject:

93% fat free ground turkey (raw). you can mix in fruit, veggies, pellets... to add nutritional value.
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beardiedragon.com
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Johelian · Retired Mod Joined: Nov 22, 2004 Posts: 848

Rottncorpse, I dont know if you know already (please forgive me if you do), but dont feed a staple of ground meats; the extra nutrients in whole foods like rodents and chicks is far better for a reptile.

Rick, the account at agama was written by someone called Tim Baker - Im pretty sure he isnt one of the agama crew, but maybe Im wrong

I personally will avoid things like bacon etc - if its not good for me then I doubt it will be good for the tegu, lol.

Rottncorpse · Member Joined: Jan 03, 2005 Posts: 55 Location: TN

but I read that feeding tegus mice other than like once or twice a month could be to fattning for them.

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

Id really like to know where you heard it, as rodents are the major part of the diet of most of the tegus I have heard of (not saying youre lying, Im just genuinely interested). Things like pinkies and young rats can be quite fatty, but rodents are used as a staple along with things like chicks and supers - in fact, some owners feel that a blue tegu can be maintained on rodents alone. Certainly you want to give preference to rodents over ground meats; ground up meat misses out on the calcium etc in bones, and so on. The only rodent-free diet I have heard of is the San Diego Zoo diet (SDZ) which involves adding bone meal and crushed vits to the meat, but the effectiveness of this diet is still in doubt; mice are still the major food item used by most tegu owners (at least in my experience).

Of course, if you overfeed mice then you will have a fat tegu

Always best to use a mixture of foods, but definitely keep the whole food items in there.

Rick · Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2005 8:06 pm Post subject:

Raw turkey can be fed, beardiedragon does it for his tegus and it seems to work well for him. His tegu, Fred, is awesome! I don't know if he does it as a staple and supplements with other foods or if the raw ground turkey is a supplement for other foods. We will have to wait for his reply.

As Johelien stated, mice are not fatty. Mice pinkies are a little fatty and pinky rats are even more fatty, but fatty mice pinkies are fine for a young active tegu and by time they are adult tegus you will not be feeding them pinkies. Mice are the most commonly used staple food, as well as young rats.

Again, I'd avoid dogfood as a staple food. I have read elsewhere that dogfood can make reptiles go blind. I will look for that content later. As far as raw ground turkey I would wait for beardiedragon to post to see how often he feeds raw turkey.

Rick
theTegu.com

Rick

beardiedragon · Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2005 8:49 pm Post subject:

When my tegus are young they get turkey most days. (adults only get once a week) We try to keep a variety of foods available. the nice thing about turkey is you put it in and they eat when they please. We also use the turkey to give young ones fruit and veggies. Besides the turkey, their other "sit in the bowl foods" include eggs (usually scrambled with some BD dragon pellets), the occasional piece of leftover fish from sunday breakfast (only the good stuff-nova, lox, salmon, tuna... but this is not often). The reds get mice once a week and as they get older, rats but only if they are out at feeding time. That has never been an issue. They also get roaches daily. we also feed them fresh pigeon eggs (one of the neighbors raises rasing pigeons). You can buy quale eggs in the store. For my Reds, they get fruit every day as adults.
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Rottncorpse · Member Joined: Jan 03, 2005 Posts: 55 Location: TN

so idealy, 2 meat sources (turkey, insects,eggs) a week, with fruit and vegetable sources every day ?

John · Posted: Wed Jan 05, 2005 5:28 pm Post subject: IMO

Rodents, insects (eggs once in awhile, NOT all the time!) fruit and veggies daily/couple times a week.
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charlene · Posted: Thu Jan 06, 2005 4:23 pm Post subject:

In the book Monitors, Tegus, and related Lizards (Bartlett, 1996) the only time canned dog or cat food is mentioned is in regards to force feeding when soaked in gatorade (for electrolytes I assume) because its small and easy to digest. This would be for a sick or malnourished lizard that could probably use the extra fats if from a high quality canned food. Other than that I can't think of another reason to use it.

herp_haven · Posted: Wed Jan 12, 2005 3:29 am Post subject:

Anything else come up on dog food causing tegu's to go blind? I'm curious.