Reptile & Amphibian Forums

For the last few years I've been using rodent lab chow as food/gutload for my crickets. I buy these brown chunks at the local feed store. They are quite inexpensive and very convenient to feed my crickets and mealworms. For several years my leopard gecko has been healthy eating crickets and mealworms gutloaded with this lab chow. I also feed the crickets occasional fruits and veggies like carrots, oranges, and greens.

I am also feeding my new male panther chameleon with these crickets.

I wonder if anyone has any thoughts about the suitability of lab chow as a gutload.

Let me know if you know of anything detrimental to chameleons in the gutload. btw, I feed this stuff to my hissing cockroaches too. They love it also.

Wouldn't the chow be too high in protein? If it is meant for good growth of a mammal, then it most likely is high protein. This is great for insect growth and for reproducing insects, but it's hard on cham kidneys.

Wait for someone else to reply with a good ratio of chow/veggies, but I would say a good one would be 1:1 chow to veggies. The protein makes for healthy bugs, the veggies make for healthy chams.