thanks for your time, must have took awhile for such a long post...anyway...
A lot longer than it should have haha. I probably reread the whole thing 10 times and made sure the links were accurate double that. I'll probably do the same with this one.
For some reason I remembered collared lizards as agamas... thanks for the info! I'm always learning something new...
No worries.
That's what I meant... It's not that they like you handling them, but the heat from your hand.
Cool. Just wanted to clarify that for others.
I feed my leos mealworms all the time. It's pretty much their staple diet, but I still feed crickets from time to time. either way I always have at least a hundred worms at hand. I meant that mealworms are hard for bearded dragons to digest. Most sources say that.
I should preface this by saying, this rant is
not a jab at you at all, you just brought the topic (in yellow) up so I wanted to address it. So sorry for the following rant.
A LOT of the husbandry "info" on the most common species are largely dogma based on anectdotes, over-reactions, or severe anthropomorphizing (I should mention, there is a lot that is legitimate, but definitely not all of it). It seems to be a much bigger problem in the herp world than the fish world for some reason. For example, in the wild, bearded dragons
eat more insects than is generally recommended in captivity (This would obviously vary seasonally, but a lot of sites recommend switching adults to mostly vegan diets as they get older*). There's also things like mealworms or supers eating through stomachs, causing impactions, &c.. It's largely BS or a result of improper husbandry, not because the lizards ate some larvae. Prolonged low temps, dehydration, infected injuries, &c., are usually what causes these problems. People often forget these lizards have evolved for millions of years to deal with the downsides of their food/environment.
Then there are just ridiculous ones (imo) like no sand, but cocofiber is okay, blah blah blah... Anyway, I digress.
Think of it this way; if an 8'' leopard gecko can down a super or mealworm, why wouldn't an 18'' agamid? It's not a perfect train of thought, but it's a fairly reasonable one.
I tried mealworms once... the beetles kept eating their babies and the remaining handful of offspring took nearly 2 months to get to an edible (and visible) size. I still had faith in it, but gave up when all the beetles ate eachother. (lol I have problems with my feeder insects cannibalizing)
As much as I'd love to have a dubia roach colony, (those would be much better than smelly crickets that just die and eat eachother) I can't convince my mom to get over the fact that they are roaches, and the fact that they are breeding in the house. She doesn't really like bugs breeding in the house, especially roaches.
How were they setup? I have my best production by separating the adults. When I got in orders of mealworms (10,000+ at a time), the larvae would go into bins with about 2'' of media --either oat bran or mazuri insect diet--. once they start pupating, I'd pull the pupae ( a pain in the @$$ time wise) and put them into a separate bin with about 0.5'' of media and egg flats like what crickets are shipped with. Then just feed each bin and sift the adult bin for worms when I start seeing them. They're also in my herp/fish room which is usually pretty warm from all the heat lamps for lizards.
When it comes to having large insect colonies in a house with a spouse/parents/room-mate that doesn't like them, I found it's better to use vague names for them like "tropical beetles" instead of "roaches" hahaha. Something about roaches pushes people away for some reason... Maybe it has something to do
with this, I don't know.
Maybe see if she'd be okay if they were double binned? It's not necessary, and an inconvenience, but you could line the outside bin with Diatomaceous earth or some water with a bit of soap as a backup incase one happens to escape. If it helps, the only times I've ever had any feeder escape is when I put the eggcrate off to the side and not realize there was something still on it. Except crickets... those get everywhere. Man I hate crickets.
also do you have any tips on training a baby fat tailed gecko to hunt better? not sure if that made sense but anyway I recently got a baby amelanistic fat tailed gecko. he's fine overall, but he's not the best with eating on his own. I feed him mealworms. he shows interest in the worms, strikes at them, but misses quite a bit. it seems like something might be wrong with his eye... not sure if it is at all but the way he looks at food... he only looks at it with his left eye. Not too troubling for me, I can deal with hand feeding him for the rest of his life if I have to. He seems to be getting better with hunting though, he's getting more accurate.
I have never had a fattail with great aim; even wild caught ones are not great at it. I think it's partially that they don't like bright lighting, so when I pull the bin out to feed, the overhead lights hurt their eyes. They are also just slow over all, so they aren't great at chasing food. Dubia were usually what got them eating for me (not many species turn them away!!!). What
really got them eating though were butterworms (
Chilecomadia moorei). They are irradiated before leaving Chile, so breeding them is essentially impossible, but man do the geckos love them! Try those, as well as leaving the food in their tank over night (or turn off the lights/put a towel over the tank). I've also had them eat gel food (mazuri carnivorous reptile gel) but that is really hit-or-miss and maybe 25% of them took it; if that. Aside from that, just make sure its husbandry is right and you should have no problems. Captive bred AFTs are rarely a problem, even the ones with minor deformities.
Also, I realized my last reply may have come off a little rude; that was not my intention (nor in this one)...
*The recommended diet may have changed in the last couple years... I don't visit any bearded dragon forums. I wouldn't last long haha.
