Reptile & Amphibian Forums

im starting to look into a beardie, and ive been reading caresheets and books, but i havent seen any of them mention canned or other prepackaged food bad or good. ive kept other repts before and know that its not always easy to get them to eat this stuff, but would like to know if its good for them or bad for them or any other advice on it?

also what about the use of frozen greens, ive seems stuff like peas and carrots listed, would it be ok to get the froozen bags and just let small portions thaw in the fridge before feeding?

As I'm rapidly finding out myself, like and dislikes may vary greatly by individual dragon. If its a baby/juvenile it needs a mostly protein diet consisting of insects. They tend to like them live. My dragon won't eat a preprocessed cricket but will a meal worm. He eats a little green leafy veggies but doesn't seem interested in fruits and vegetables yet. Some people say their baby dragons won't touch any vegetable matter and have to acclimatize them to it. The one benefit of live prey is that it aids in providing a percentage of the animals moisture in their diet. Some people with their older dragons feed them preprocessed foods but it is a chance you will have to take to see if yours like them.

i know its realy up to my dragon weither he/she will eat them or not. im realy looking at it more if its healthy for them or not. take dog food for example not all dog food is good for dogs some of it its just junk.

as far as getting them to eat the dead crickets, something i learned with leopard geckos who are pretty much total movement eaters. theres a company i can rember who but they make a food dish that has a very slight vibration to make the food move. i cant say it will work for beardies but it worked for all 3 of my leos who would not touch anything that didnt move. i was hopping i could get that to work on a young beardie for crickets. mixed with live crickets as well.

In my opinion all that pre processed stuff is fine for a treat or when live insects can be found, but should not be a staple food provided. Same with the pelleted foods.

I have tried the 'cooked in the can' type foods and my bearded dragon won't always eat it, some she did, some she won't even look at. My blue tongue skinks on the other hand, loved all of them.

None of my reptiles like the zoo med pellets...and I only tried it again because i won some during IHS this past summer. Most of it now is being used for cricket food or mixed up in the blending along with greens for the skinks...its the only way they will eat them.
-----
PHLdyPayne