Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi,

Been doing some very thourough research in to my Sav at the moment and I want to ask your opinions on the following food items as a TREAT in their diet and not a staple;

1. Slugs/snails (if snails are ok what type?)
2. Millipedes
3. Goldfish
4. Amphibians
5. eggs

I couldn`t use amphibians personally as food but I am just asking opinions on the pro`s and con`s of the above.

At the moment I feed her roughly 5 Adult mice a week and about as much Adult Locust as she can eat in between. I`ve been told that really there is no need to add extra food to Sav`s diet other than that but hey it`s human nature to want to give any Pet a varied diet, isn`t it?

Thank You To Any Replies In Advance

Phil
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1 Chameleo Calyptratus, 1 Varanus Exanthematicus, 1 Morelia Spilota Sp.??

"Been doing some very thourough research in to my Sav at the moment and I want to ask your opinions on the following food items as a TREAT in their diet and not a staple"

Seems like you were researching some outdated sources and a bad one. Heres a bit of info on these things.

1. Slugs/snails (if snails are ok what type?) -Monitors love slugs and snails but things to think about are insecticides, parasites. Ive heard of people using captive raised snails after a few generations.

2. Millipedes- If you have a small enough monitor that eats them because they eat large millipedes in Africa, then again watch for insecticides and parasites.

3. Goldfish - No good as far as nutrition, a better source would be properly fed trout, catfish, loaches, etc.

4. Amphibians- Expensive diet, again parasites.

5. eggs-Embryonated eggs are good for them, but store bought nonembryonated eggs can be fed on occaision because they have Avidin which can help lead to a vitamin B deficiancy.

If you are working with a meium to large monitor feed whole rodents as the majority of their diet. Keep it simple and inexpensive.

It certainly should be OK to feed millipedes, according to Bennett, adult sav's diet is about 50% of them!

I have been thinking about if this could be an important fact for our sav's health, millipedes are much richer in calcium than insects, for example. Could it be that the reason sav's are not thriving very well on an insect diet and much better on rodents despite they eat almost only inverts in the wild, is that they eat these millipedes instead of mainly insects? I guess the millipedes are much more digestable than insects, because their exoskeletons are calcium based.

For the majority of people because 99% of them are bought by people for $5-40, are impulse bought by someone who knows little to nothing about the animal and will not spend what it takes to take proper care of them. If 16,000 werent imported per year for pets, and their prices were close to other species (niles included) you would see a few or more people breeding them. Why try to sell a monitor CBB for $150-300 to break even when the average dealer is selling them for $5 WC?
Their cost relates directly to the amount of care that they are given by most owners. This is why most live 6 months to a year, dont grow, dont eat normal, are so calm, etc etc.

Hm, as far as I understand, even experienced monitor keepers often have troubles with them too. I know about the imports, and feel horrible about it. I have keept them for about 8 years, and I still don't feel I do it completely right. Bennetts book helped quite a bit though. I feed mainly mice now, have tried insects for some time, but it's not good, they loose weight, get dehydrated, has loose stools and so on. I think the discovery of the very high intake of millipedes is interesting, because they are quite different from insects. Has anyone tried to breed them for sav food?