Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have two cherryhead redfoots and one is an extremely picky eater - almost never eats the greens I provide for her (I have tried romaine, collard, and mustard on a rotating basis). When I mix an apple, pumpkin, or strawberry in with the greens, she picks those out and leaves the greens behind (she also does not seem to be a big fan of carrots, in case that is relevant). When I provide just greens, she will often ignore them and not eat for a couple of days. She also seems to be against eating the food out of the tray, so I have to strategically place the food throughout the terrarium for her and hope that she eats it when it blocks her path. Strangely, there have been a couple of times when she will completely ignore fresh, wet greens that I have put in the terrarium in favor of a dried up, old leaf that I neglected to remove from a day or so earlier.

Her sister will eat anything placed in front of her, in any quantity and under any circumstances, which makes me confident that there is nothing wrong with the food or their living conditions to cause a loss of appetite (and yes I have tried separating them when eating, but with no more favorable results).

I took the picky eater to the vet just a few weeks ago and she came out with a clean bill of health. The vet had no advice besides to ensure the food is cold and wet when it is served (which is ironic since she goes for the dried up stuff).

In general I am looking for advice or thoughts on two items:

--Has anyone else had a similar problem and managed to overcome it? Your pearls of wisdom are kindly requested.

--From everything I have learned, read and gathered, greens are an integral part of a redfoot's diet. What happens if she is only eating the fruits and other veggies I am providing? Right now I would say her diet is about 25% greens and 60% fruit and 15% other vegetables.

When this was happening with my russian, people told me to dice up whatever he liked with whatever he wouldn't eat, so small that he couldn't tell the difference. Maybe the smell will get it to eat some of the other stuff?

Yes,- that is good advice!
What I often do is put the fruit I feed my redfoots,- papaya, mango, cactus fruit, cantaloupe and black figs,- into a small food processor and transform it into a creamy liquid form. Then I cut up the greens in strips and use just enough of the fruit to serve as a 'salad dressing'. That way everything tastes fruit, but the total fruit intake is rather low.
My girls / guys are good eaters and I don't have to bother to cut up the salads very small, but in your case I would go with really fine strips. The reason why I started doing this is simply that they, like all redfoots, LOVE fruit and would consume huge amounts of them. I do prefer their poops to be more on the solid side though, and so I try to keep the fruit intake on the lower side.
If you use very ripe mangos or papayas, that are very sweet and have a strong scent, you should be able to convince your picky eater that salad can taste good too,- just needs a dressing. Adding a strawberry to the mix can also help the taste and scent aspect.

Good luck,- I hope you will be able to convince your redfoot to eat a healthy diet! My first redfoot was a picky eater too initially. But after a while I decided, that a healthier diet was called for. After refusing the above mentioned diet for 5 days (leaving me quite upset and worried) my redfoot started eating the 'new salad' and has never stopped since.

Gaby