Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi. I've heard that you should dust the ants or crickets with tannic acid. Does anyone else do that? If not, what do you use to dust the insects with for the horny toads? What works the best? Also, has anyone had any luck with breeding these little guys? I'd like to try to breed them and I want all the info I can get before attempting this. Please help. Thank you!

o not use tannic acid! That is a poison and you will kill the horned lizards. Tannic acid is used for tanning leather and such other things, and healing sores. There is nothing that even remotly supports the use of tannic acid with horned lizards. Lester G. Milroy III

Sherry, I'm sure you mean formic acid. As Lester said, tannic acid would not be good. It is an acid produced by plants and is toxic. Formic acid is a substance produced by many species of ants. It is believed by some that formic acid may be an essential nutrient for HLs that they get from the ants in their diet, although I'm not aware of any actual data that support this. That's not to say that there is none, just that I'm not aware of any actual research supporting this assertion. They certainly need something that they get from the ants, but as far as I know, no one has ever actually identified what that is. In fact the one reference I do know of regarding formic acid and harvester ants is a very old one, citied in Ants by William Wheeler, 1910, in which a chemical analysis of one species of harvester ant showed no trace of formic acid whatsoever (there have been studies that show formic acid is not the venom in their sting, as used to be believed). That being said, I wouldn't bother trying to supplement their food with formic acid either, as it probably serves no good, and may be harmful, assuming you could even find any.

As far as dusting goes, I give my HLs a few small crickets dusted with a standard lizard mineral and vitamin supplement once a week, just to make sure that they are getting enough vitamins and minerals. Even though I feed them their fill of harvester ants every day, HLs in the wild do supplement their own diets with other things besides ants. Since I can't replicate everything they eat, I figure a little vitamin and mineral supplement is probably good for them. I wouldn't give them more than that, as minerals and vitamins are generally only trace nutrients anyway, and can be very harmful in high concentrations. I'm not saying that the diet I feed mine is perfect, but if you're already feeding mostly ants, and if you give them a dusted meal once every week or two, you're probably giving the best care you can.

I haven't yet bred any of mine, but I know a few people on here have, so I'll leave that question to them. Cheers and good luck.

Gary

Thank you both for your information. A person at a reptile pet store told me to dust the crix with tannic acid and even showed me a bottle of it he was using! Thanks for clearing that up for me. Now I just hope those little guys at the pet store are ok!