Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am a new Bearded Dragon owner and am asking a dumb question. I am told I can hand feed my beardie. He is 8 months old. Do I offer him food from tweezers? Have the food in my fingers? Palm of the hand? Please advise. Thanks.

Depends on the food, I guess. When I feed my beardie leaves I usually hold them in my finger, and let go as soon as she bites it. The leaf, that is, not my finger... Other food (pieces of fruit, for instance) I just place in the palm of my hand. I prefer not to use tweezers, as I feel the beardie connects more to me when I literally hand feed her. Instead of getting all excited when she sees a tweezer, she now gets excited when she sees my hand

But you have to be careful (especailly with live food that their more likely to pounce on), beardie bites really hurt.

Everyone thus far has made a valid point. I do the same when feeding my BD greens. I have also "taught" my lizard to know when a cricket is comming. As in I lock the cricket in my fist, then lower it into the dragon's tank and then open my hand flat. That allows my dragon to crawl up my hand to snatch his meal. This is giving us quite the bond between one another. BUT if the cricket is near my finger tips, they sometimes become the target of his strike. No blood has ever been drawn, and I've never yelled out in pain or anything like that, but for those of you who are not looking to get bit, I wouldn't recommend this action.

A better way to hand feed crickets it to hold your BD in one hand, and hold the cricket by its jumping LEGS. (I say legs b/c if you hold it by only 1, the rest of the body will detach in a defense mechanism). Then allow the dragon to take the cricket from there.
Hope all goes well.

~Nick

Personally I let Fuego chase the crickets & worms after I drop them in his tank. He knows they're coming though because I always use a bright yellow 16oz disposable cup to dust them. He sees me pick up the cup and he's jumping around before i even reach for the crickets. Plus I always drop them onto the salad bowl.
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Ross

1.0 Bearded Dragon (Fuego)
2.1 Roommates (require more cleaning up after than the dragon)

One note of mild "caution" about handfeeding: Beardies are very good at training humans . It is possible for one to get so accustomed to hand-feeding that that becomes its preferred way to eat. When one of our rescues was first home he was recovering from amputations so hand-feeding was the only way he could eat. Well, it's a year post-recovery, he's as healthy and adept as any beardie could be and he still looks at dropped or dished food items like "You surely don't expect *me* to get that, do you??" and will only casually amble over to eat after he is quite sure we really aren't going to pick them up for him.

Handfeeding is very nice for bonding, but aside from the risk of terribly spoiled lizards , I do believe they benefit from the exercise and experience of "the hunt", so I choose to reserve handfeeding for special treat times and only after they have eaten all their veggies.

Enjoy your dragon,
Michele

1.1.1 Bearded dragons (All rescues)
1.0 Corn snake (rescue)
0.1 California King
4.5 Royal (Ball) Pythons (3 rescues)
and assorted mammals (all rescues)