Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am a new ig owner, as I have stated many times before, lol. When giving your igs squash does it have to be cooked first?

No you don't have to cook it first. I just peel the skin and cut it into small enough pieces that they can eat. I give my iggys skinny pieces about 1/2 to 3/4 inch long. Don't feed your iggy the seeds though. You will find out that your iggy will most likely love butternut squash. Mine go nuts for it. And the good thing about butternut squash is that it is a staple veggie for them.

Nope, no cooking needed. I either peel and slice, usually just the day I go shopping so Tempest gets his squash right away (he spots it and starts tapping on the glass), or chop it up, and toss it in the blender peel and all. Either way, he loves it!

Thanks for the info!!! I wasnt quite sure on the preparation, I have never even bought squash before! I am gonna go try and cut some up for Cabo now...

Everything except for greens and most fruits get grated with a cheese grater, After it is peeled and seeded of course. It makes it faster than having to slice it and sweet potato and most squashes can be mixed together and stored in a zip-loc baggie and kept in the fridge for upwards a week or until you buy greens again unless u are buying greens every day or every other day
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Heather, Vern, Andy, Router, April And OODLES of fish

Since our iguanas still a little guy (or gal*lol*) still, even though Snoopy's grown enough to need a new cage because the 20gal tall is to small now, i peal most of the foods, unless i trust them because they were grown in our or my fiance's parent's garden and were not waxed or sprayed with pesticides and what not, even then i scrub them good.

Then i cut them into peices and toss them in the food processor. Iguana's do not chew their food, so i figure the smaller the peices the more nutrients snoopy is getting. I started out choping stuff in little peices then noticed his droppings were chunky like. Then i started food processing the veggies and vitamins together and freeze them in ice cube trays then put them in gallon bags, but i still chop the greens seperate and put them in a tub in the fridge. That way the nutrients in the greens stays put, since veggies expecially green leach vitamins out when thawing.

I also have a turtle (and bunnies which some times get some v salad) as well so i can change the percentage depending on who i am feeding. Since both my iguana and turt do not eat much i was having a HUGE problem with veggies spoiling on me. That's why i started freezing. Once Snoopy gets bigger i might be able to make a salad and just put it in the fridge.

The pic below was taken shortly after bringing the guy home from the pet store... i so need to take more pics!! *lol*

Be aware that many of the B complex vitamins are destroyed or lost in freezing, so you may want to supplement with a Vit B complex if you are using any kind of frozen foods. From my research commercial flash freezing seems to be more detrimental to the vitamin, but any kind of freezing will do it.

Yes, Thiamin is the vitamin lost by green veggies when frozen. Thuman is Vitamin B-1.

I add Thiamin, Beta Carotene( which its hard to overdose an animal on), Calcium and a little multi vitamin, i usually make different mixes of them all so i can change the diet and amounts of vitmins incase i see a problem in my iguana that i could correct with vitamins.