Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i understand many people say UVB is a waste of money, and i do not use uvb bulbs. i use the rep-cal d3 no phosph. on my tegu's fruit, however he eats more rats than fruit, do you guys dust your live rats before feeding? my tegu seems to be in great shape and has only been outside a few times and never had uvb, i would just like to know for certain he is making use of the calcium

Whole food, as in mice or rats, contains pretty much all the nutrition your tegu needs. I have reds, so mine need more vitimin C, but I've not suplimented with calcium or vitimin D since mine got beyond crickets.

Leslie

yes but i thought that without vit d3 supplementation or uvb from sun/bulb they cannot make use of the calcium they are getting?

They apparently get sufficient vitimin D from the prey animal.

Leslie

Whole animals dont need it, except insects which you should dust with calcium and vit d3. Just another reason the whole animals diet is so much better than anything out there, period. Think of the mouse, or whatever as a convenient nutrient filled package that needs no supplements and you will automatically know what the ingredients are, I say this because if a product says "not for human consuption" the label doesnt have to have the truth in ingredients by law, so there could be anything in it. Besides the results speak for themselves alone. Ive seen monitors, tegus, etc that were switched to the whole animal diet that suddenly grew and in no time at all that looked like a different animal alltogether, where prior to that they were practically on their death bed. Ask anyone who has monitors breeding what they feed them, whole animal diet.

I had posted the explanation to this awhile back. It was a long post so hopefully it can be found in the archive, by doing a search.