Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Latest Green Ig Book by Jacabsen,DMV/PHD has a whole chapter on Nutrition in Captivity. Part of his summary of recommendations states "with the advent of nutritionally balanced iguana feeds, it is no longer advisable to feed salad-type diets as they are often nutritionally imbalanced." Book recommends Zigler's(800-841-6800) iguana diet,NZP version no 7 and Marion (800-327-7974) Reptile food for herbivorous reptiles as the only diets tested that met their recommendations for juveniles and subadults.

Has anyone used either of these diets ? Anyone have comments regarding dry foods.

or prepaired. If the animal is not drinking I have seen these foods plug them up solid within a matter of a few feedings. Water intake is very important when using these dry foods. I guess this would be more of a problem with desert herbivorous lizards such as sauromalus and dipsosaurus that sometimes do not drink standing water when offered. Just make sure they are getting plenty of water when using these foods. Also there have been reports of dry food causing mouth problems. Tom

There has also been quite a bit of research lately on wild and captive diets in Cyclura. If you know how to mix a diet of salads, it is great for the animals. This book is probably justifying the dry diets as an overall safeguard against those who do not know how to correctly feed iguanid lizards. I personally do not use any of these pellet diets; we do use a high fiber diet used in conjunction with 7 types of greens. All diet info, etc. will be in the husbandry manual I'm currently writing for the AZA - I will post when it will be available and how to get it.

Jeff, I for one cannot wait to see what you publish. I have been feeding my cyclura basically the same thing as my green iguana, the good greens and a mix of other veggies I put in the food processor. Any more specifics to tailor to the cyclura is long overdue!!!

Thanks!
Carole

I think your correct, but most keepers have only 1 or 2 iguanid lizards, which making a "correct" mixed green salad would be easy and non time consuming. Zoos have thier (I hate to use the word, but can't think of another) "grunts" and volunteers who have all the time and resouces delivered to them to make these meals. I personally have found dry food to be a "godsend", because I can feed and water 40 enclosures with 100 /- lizards (I can't keep count anymore) in 2 hours.
The minuses in feeding greens to me are 1.Spoiling and drying of uneaten food 2. Runny feces 3.Time taken to buy greens. 4.Time taken to chop greens 5.Money spent on greens.

The pluses of dry food are 1.Uneaten food stays eatable for days 2.Feces are easy to clean pellets 3.I always have 5 gallon buckets of this stuff (Zoo Med)on hand and delivered. 4. All I do is scoop and dump in bowl and add either calcium or vitamin/mineral suppliment every other feeding. 6.It takes much more greens to equal in volume the amount of dry food that can be eaten.
I produce fertile eggs and healthy offspring. Since I am a business owner, I really am limited on my time I can spend feeding or cleaning, so I really need it to go quick for me so I can have time to enjoy these animals also.

Hi Mark, can you tell me how long you have been using just the pellets? And do you moisten them?

Thanks,
Carole

Oh, one more thing, can you elaborate on why you picked Zoo-Med over the others like Rep-Cal, Mazuri, Ziegler etc? I use the Rep-Cal in smaller amounts but am unhappy with the amount of food coloring in there. I mean, they eat it and like it but it really colors the poop. I just dont know how good that is for them.

Thanks again,
Carole

I started using it because it was collard green based and not alphalfa or corn. They have however changed the formula, and it is now alphalfa based probably to cut costs. I do like, and it seems the iguanas also, like eating the "rabbit looking" pellets rather than a crumbled dry mash or bright colored small ball shaped foods which the other brands sell. I also supplement the dry food with calcium one meal and vitamins the next.

I know this is off topic but I don't think you visit the chuckwalla forum. In your experience have you ever worked on diet for sauromalus? The reason I ask is that in captivity with all the greens that are fed they seem to get way too much water. Well when they deficate it is a real mess(water everywhere). Have you ever done anything to eleviate this or have any suggestions. I have tried using shake from alfalfa hay but that does not seem to work. I have tried several different types of pellets including dry reptile foods, rabbit pellets and even horse pellets. Either they wont touch the food because of the pellets or they become addicted to them, especially the horse, and they will not eat the greens. I have lost a couple young animals in the past to impaction from the pelleted food. Rabbit seems to be the worst for this. Several people on the forum have suggested pelleted food but I think in order to do this I need to keep a water bowl in the enclosures and I do not like to do this because of the possibility of bacteria proliferation. I though that with your experience you may be able to suggest something or is this something I just have to keep dealing with? Thank you. Tom Greb

HI guys,
First Mark; I can see how it would be easier for you to use the pellets and thats fine. I'm guessing your animals are probably outdoors? That would have positive implications as well. For Tom, no, I haven't worked much with Chucks. For both of you: we have alleviated runny feces by mixing a fiber diet into our greens. Its Marion leafeater mixed with a high fiber herbivore pellet. These are chopped into almsot a sand consistency, wet down, and fed with salads.

Any recomendations for a herbivore pellet? What is the percentage ratio of the Leafeater mix to powdered herbivore pellet? And is it critcal how much of this mix you mix with the salad? Thanks for your time I really appreciate it. Tom

They both come as pellets and our browse people grind them up. They are from Marion Zoological. I don't have the exact amounts per salad with me, but its about a small handful over 800-1000 grams of salad.

N/P = no post.