With this subject.



One is, folks are not willing to have their success rated, which means, there is no actual difinition of success. To many, having a heartbeat is success. As soon as that stops, they get another and start all over with their success. Without a actual rating system, the term "success" becomes meaningless.



Its my opinion, on a scale of 1 to 10, the turkey diet in any of its forms, at best rates a four or five. And that includes the SDZ. While they kept some monitors living for a period of time and with a certain amount of problems and successes, its hard to tell what actual level of success they had. The reason is, they never produced offspring which means the diet cannot be measured in terms of generations. Whole prey diets, have a history of many generations with many species. So a comparison is impossible. They say, that was not their goal, which is fine, but that eliminates them for the conversation because others have taken other diets to many generations.



An analogy is, if we were talking about racecar fuel(a diet is fuel) one group says they have a better fuel, They go on and on about how good the fuel is, but then asked if they won any races(what racing is all about) they say no, we chose not to race.



In this instance, you can certainly choose to use their racecar fuel, but its a good idea to not think about winning any races. Well the SDZ turkey diet has not won any races, its gone around the track a few times, but won a race, no, as they chose not to race.



As a very experienced racer, I could indeed make some adjustments to my racecars and have some success with the turkey diet fuel. As I understand racecar technology. But the question is why, if there are better fuels and there certainly are, why choose something middle of the road?



Also, many feed turkey as a PART of a diet, then claim its good. Hmmmmmmmm I include donuts in my diet, but I would not only eat donuts. As part of a whole prey diet, any mix of turkey is ok, but of no real benefit to the monitor, but doesn't hurt them either.



In my opinion, if there is a scale of 1 to 10 and the upper levels are easy to obtain, then why not use them. So, whole prey items are proven without a shadow of a doubt and they are easy to obtain. Yes, turkey is cheaper, but a good proven diet should be part of the responsibility of ownership. Is it possible some want to feed turkey because its cheap and it would allow them to have more monitors and not have a normal cost of ownership?



I use to feed that turkey mix years ago, but found out it was better to figure out BETTER(cheaper) ways to obtain whole prey items(rodents, insects, etc). There indeed are many ways to feed whole prey items less expensively.



Remember, from the mouths of the INVENTORS, that turkey mix is SUPPOSE to be like(equal) a mouse. Hmmmmmmmm then why not use a mouse. Yes I know, thats toooooooo simple.



If for some reason the keeper is unable to feed whole prey items, then perhaps monitors are not for them.



As a measure of success, I have a female that just laid her 61st clutch as a result of a rodent diet. As a comparison, the SDZ has not produced 60 clutches of varanids, in the history of the zoo with all the monitors they ever kept, on any diet. So there really is no comparison.



Again, a clutch represents a begining of a new generation. Oh, that female of ours is a fourth generation female from our facility. A generation also means hatching the egg, then raising the hatchling to successful reproduction. The number of generations verifies the quality of the diet. The number of clutches per female shows the actual amount of support and yes, diet is very important in the support of all monitors, wild or captive. Cheers

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