Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've heard quite a bit of debate about what is good and what is bad substrate for a beardie. I pretty much know what is reasonable and what to stay away from however I haven't heard anyone's opinion on desert blend Lizard litter, made up of crushed up walnut shells. I used this for my leopard gecko with wonderful results. It was easy to clean, didn't stink, and was digestible. Any comments for use with a beardie?

Check it out here:

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Product/Prod_Display.cfm?pcatid=7793&N=2006 114035

I use this stuff with both of my dragons and find it is ok, not going to say great because I don't belive it is fully digestable by dragons but is probly not as bad as useing sand.
I like the way it looks and my dragons seem to like it as they match the color well and they like digging into it when they sleep. It is somewhat absorbant and is very easy to clean, Now I have found some from the petstore to be infested with some kind of beetle and don't know how to get rid of them aside from bakeing or washing the stuff. The bettles dont seem to bother the dragons and are so small they ignore them, still I wish to get rid of the bugs.
I also try to feed my buddys from a dish to minimise ingestion of the litter.
I also have alphafa pellets but have not used them yet, allergys will be a problem and I have read that the dust can bother the dragons, but the lizard littler has some dust too so unless one goes with news paper one can't win.
The breeder that I got Draka from also used compressed paper litter, it was ugly but seemes to work very well.

crushed walnut is bad for dragons. It can cause impactions, tends to promote bacterial growth, can damage the lining of intestines etc. Deffinitely not good to use at all. Washed children's playsand is much better though still has some risk of causing impaction.

For an ideal of the risks crushed walnut can cause, the link below shows the amount of crushed walnut shell removed from the gut of a bearded dragon. (the link shows many pictures of a young dragon who died being cut up (after death of course) so it may be unsuited for younger children) Somebody here posted it awhile ago, I kept the link for future reference as I found it was every educational and interesting.

mrskingsbioweb.com/beardeddragngrossanatomy.htm
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PHLdyPayne

Looks like it's time to dump the litter, Thank you for the link.
off topic question, what is the worm found inside the poor little guy? My dragon bob is just getting over parasaites.

Bob is currently geting used to his new substrate, I whent out and bought 200lbs of play sand that was 3.59 for 50lbs, lot cheaper then the other stuff! The short term down side is the sad was damp so bob had to sleep the night in a bin while his sand warmed up and dried out. Draka will get her substrate replaced today