Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i just heard that too much cal. is bad...i didnt know...i was wondering if you could tell me if im using to much cal...

i put my crickets and supers in a shacker with cal in them.. and when i give george a salad i put another type of cal, (its a yellowish color, i dont remember what it is called) but i sprinkle that on the salad and i put the supers in it(with no cal.) i do the crickets and supers everyday, and the salad everyother day...is that okay?
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Bearded Dragon x1 (George)
Boxers x4 (Katie, Mac, Zeek, Zena)
Cats x3 (JJ, Ricky, Smokey)

Brittany and George

It depends on how old he is. I can't quite tell from the picture if he's full grown or not.

The general rule is that for a growing beardie calcium (white powder) should be used daily, and multivitamins (yellow powder) should be used 3-4 times a week. For an adult, you should cut back to calcium 3-4 times a week and vitamins 1-2 times a week.

Also I would suggest feeding salads daily, for a juvenile or adult, and espcially for an adult. The older a beardie gets the more veggies and less insects it should be getting. Once it's full grown it really should be getting salad daily and insects only a few times a week.

So if he's still a juvenile you're doing just fine, except I'd give him more veggies. If he's an adult you can cut back on both suppliments, and insects, and increase the veggies.
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Amanda
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2.0 bearded dragons (Ocho / Domo-kun)
0.1 kingsnake (Rio)
1.0 ferret (Playstation)
1.0 cat (Wally)
0.1 dog (Tima)

I just posted this below but thought It would be good to put it here also before the other sinks to the bottom.

Simply ingesting calcium, in any quantity, means nothing by itself. As we all know for calcium to be utilized it needs to enter the blood stream. Parathyroid hormone (PTH) and vitamin D regulate calcium balance in the blood. PTH is produced by the parathyroid glands, and most cases of hypercalcemia (an excessive amount of calcium in the blood which can lead to kidney damage as well as bone demineralization) are caused by a dsyfunction of PTH or the parathyroid glands and is unrelated to the amount of calcium ingested.

What this means is that as long as the parathyroid gland and PTH are functioning properly, any excessive calcium ingested is excreted and does not enter the blood stream where it causes problems. It would take huge amounts of calcium continuously ingested over a long period of time to itself cause problems.
Again, primary hypercalcemia is not a significant problem, hypercalcemia secondary to conditions such as cancer or granulomatous disease are the problem.

Excessive vitamin D is a different story. Vitamin D is one of only 4 fat soluable vitamins, and is the most toxic because it causes problems at only 4x its needed dose. The principal direct toxic effects of vitamin D are excessive absorption of calcium from the intestine and resorption of calcium from bone. This results in deposition of calcium and phosphorus in soft tissues all over the body, with particular damage to the heart, blood vessels and kidneys. Too much vitamin D is BAD. One last thing to remember though, this only applies to dietary vitamin d, as vitamin d from uv is synthysized differently, one of the reasons natural sunlight and uvb lights are much better than supplements.
Paul Kemes