Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My ~9 inch WC rescued mali is definitely fattening up, he's gone from 98 grams to 137 and is parasite free... When I finally got him to eat store-bought stuff, he'd only eat greens and completely ignore veggies, which didn't concern me too much. Now he's a little less picky and eats just about everything (when he feels like it, it changes from day to day), but he's not too fond of peas, which I found interesting... Lately he's been going absolutely NUTS for carrot slivers, and he'll keep eating them till they're gone. I just wanted to double-check the nutrition of raw carrots for reptiles, I thought I remembered reading somewhere that carrots are bad for some herps because of the high vitamin A content, but I'm not sure... Should I try to limit his carrot intake? (he's not going to be happy about that)

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1.0 RES, Spunky
1.0.1 Mali Uromastyx, Ajani, Guban(Goober)
1.0 Brazilian Rainbow Boa, Nico
0.0.1 Northern Blue Tongue Skink, Owajabi(Jabi)
3.1 Cats
1/2.0 rabbit (friend and I went 50/50)
0.1 Gerbils
1.0 Betta, Nigel

I'm not sure how many carrots are too many. But, you do not have to worry about vitamin A toxicity from carrots. Vitamin A is needed, but can be toxic if given in excess. Carrots contain beta carotene, which can be converted into vitamin A within the body. It is difficult to overdose on beta carotene because the body can excrete what it doesn't need, and even if overdoses do occur the most common side effect is orange coloration which will disappear once doses are lowered. Vitamin A deficiency is a common problem in many captive herps and giving beta carotene is a safer way of making sure herps get all the vitamin A they need.

-Alice