Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Does anyone feed silkworms as the staple insect for their dragons? I've heard that the worms are more nutritious than crickets. Is this true? Do they have a high calcium content? How long can they be kept without being fed? Any feedback would be appreciated.

Silkworms are an excellent substitute for crickets and other insects. They are high in calcium and protein and low in fat and exoskeleton so are easily digestible.

Silkworms should be fed either mulberry leaves or the silkworm prepared food once every day or they won't last very long. (never starved my worms so don't know how long it takes ot die if it isnt' fed. However, if they do not eat enough they will die when they shed their skins).

The silkworms themself if fed and kept clean (very easy to keep them clean, just put them on an egg carton or coffee tray, they won't move off it and y ou can tip it over and let all the poo fall out into a container then dump the poo out. Just make sure you pick up any worms that happen to fall into the bottom of the container. Change the carton every couple weeks once it starts looking soiled). I had about 300 silkworms, 1" long when I oredered them, last me about 2 months with just one bearded dragon to feed. He ate anywhere between 18-10 worms a day, the amount decreasing as they get older and unlike crickets you can feed them larger worms than the space between their eyes because of their soft bodies. (and well, they fold easier and easier to chew).

Only problem I have with silk worms is the cost. I'd LOVE to be able to use silkies for my adults, but as far as I can tell they'd cost way too much to be feasable. How much did you spend to get your colony of 300? Why didn't you try breeding them? If anybody has a trick to getting cheaper silk worms or an easy way to breed them, I'd love to hear it.

You can buy 1,000 eggs for 15 bucks... or 2,000 eggs for 17.50. You hatch them out, raise them for a little bit, then feed to your dragon. That doesn't sound too expensive... 1,000 crickets would cost way more than 15 bucks at my pet store!

I only have one dragon though, so I'm not too worried about price. It's a different situation if you have a breeding colony.

what site are you looking at? The only way I've found to order silkworms is the worms themselves, and they were very expensive.

Just did a quick search and this is what I came up with...

http://www.mulberryfarms.com/index.php?page=products

http://www.aurorasilk.com/shop/eggs.shtml

Good Luck...

yep, just did a search and found the mulberryfarms page. Anybody have any idea if small silk worms would be good for baby dragons, or should I stick with the crickets?

if your order 1,000 crixets... its really cheap...

i think around 10 bucks... or so...

Silkworms are a little more expensive than crickets. However you really only need about 1/3 as much silkworms as crickets since they are alot more filling and have less undigestable stuff. I paid $77 or around there for the 300 worms I ordered, and that included a pound of prepared food. This is in canadian funds as well. I get mine from www.silkworms.ca who also sell eggs. I haven't decided if I would buy eggs and grow them that way. I may instead just keep a coupld dozen worms and let them mature and lay eggs, but I really don't think I need to bother right now.

One inch or smaller (newly hatched) silkworms should be fine for baby dragons but with the amount they eat, may be cheaper to stick with crickets till they are older.

I've read that they cocoon in 27 days. Is there a way to keep them in larva form for longer than that?