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Properly Feeding tree lizards is vitally important, in most cases we do it wrong because most books are misleading or totally off base.

This post is for all lizard keepers who experienced fatalities especially with egg binding tree lizards, also for the concerned keeper wanting a healthy captive.

First a little biology, what characterises a tree lizard?

Of course being arboreal is the first and foremost characteristic, but theirs a lot more to it then that, evolving as an arboreal means physical adaptations like lighter bodies, many things we don’t see at first glance.

Lighter bone structure; ground lizards rely on muscle power to escape predatory or capture prey, they have thick bones to hold larger muscles.

Limited muscle mass; being arboreal means relying on stealth and ambush rather then flight and chase, they have little need for large muscle.

Little ability to store fat in tail or legs; in lizards fat naturally stores over muscle as muscle feeds on fat, tree lizards have little leg and tail muscles so theirs no need or ways to store fat there.

Why all this talk about fat?
Simply because the only place these lizards can store fat is there fat bodies (2 abdominal pouch) and once these are full fat can only accumulate in the liver, unlike humans they cant store fat under there skin. Now don’t get me wrong the liver is not for fat storing, however we often force our captives thru bad feeding to store fat in the liver, hens fatty liver syndrome.

I know some of you have been breeding other lizards forever without any liver problems, yes but most lizards can burn bad fats via muscles in the form of energy, tree lizards on the other hand do not move allot and sins they have no other fat storage, they are prone to fatty liver.

Now iv already covered the husbandry of these lizards and most keepers understand about metabolism and heat relation, assuming these are understood and supplied and that nesting options are good, then feeling is the only potential problematic.

Lately the arrival of new insect feeders have enriched our captives diets, perhaps to much for tree lizards, I have recently analysed a few commercially available species, I have also analysed via biopsy the liver of various lizards. this can be applied to your captives in general regardless of specie.

Prey; ………Moi%.......Kcal/g………Cal-fat%............Cal-Prot%
Earthworm…90……….0.5…………..20………………75
Mealworm….60……….1.8…………..50………………50-70
Superworm…60……….1.5…………..70………………28-30
Waxworm….50-60…...1.8…………...85……………....15-20
Silkworm…..80……….1……………..20………………80
Crickets……75………..1-1.5………...35……………...65

Understand these analyse will fluctuate depending on what you feed your insects!
Calories from fat are wasted energy and what you need to limit in your lizards diet.
I keep my feeders on oak-bran and provide carrots as moisture, summer I feed them grass, dandelions and trifle (best foods on the planet) as these are high energy low fat foods.

Some literature advise on feeding fatty foods when a lizard in either thin or gravid, this is wrong, providing a staple diet of low fat foods (vitamins-mineral supplemented) is all your lizards will ever need, gravid or not a steady supply of good foods will promote health.
Technically; fat proteins affect the reproductive system in many ways, these are empty proteins that cant support life, they impair the immune system and the resulting are dead embryo’s, moulting eggs or very week eggs, they also have there toll on the female, she will be undernourished and week from these empty calories, mostly unable to grow and nest in due time resulting in egg bind age, and death.
These useless fat proteins are the last to be used as energy, they eventually constrict vessels and disrupt your females cycling.

I conducted this study because some of you lost a few females egg bind, though I have never experienced such problems with my captives, I needed to understand how and why such problems occur, hopefully this post will help you avoid such misfortunes.

Happy herping

Ps. Feel free to re-edit this post as my English is not perfect, however the information is accurate enough to be useful.

Jobi,
What is the balance of fat/protein for our feeder items as far as the ratios. My animals get mostly earthworms, which I see are lower in fat per your chart. The babies get some mealworms but the adults don't. So, I would guess that this is one of the better choices of feeders. Correct me and explain why not if you believe otherwise please.

Also, I occasionally raise up silkworms, mostly in the summer when I can gather mulberry leaves, but sometimes in spring or fall on the powdered food you cook up. These also seem to be on the low side as far as fat.

The only other things that my animals get are the roaches. These get a high protein diet of dog food and lots of fruits and veggies. So, I am guessing that this is too high in fat as the dog food is pretty fatty. Perhaps I should look for a lower fat protein like maybe legumes for the protein part of their diet. They will cannibalize if they don't get enough protein but I sure don't want to give them the fats if it isn't good for my animals.

The only other thought I have on this is that of 3 females that died eggbound only one of them had any fat in her abdomen. The other two were very lean showing no fat at all. If there is no fat in the abdomen is it still possible that there is a fatty liver?

Regards,
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Marcia - FroggieB Dragons
www.froggieb.com/MHDHome.html

Hello Marcia!

This study has broth me to make many changes in regard to my feeding, what I formally tough was healthy weight was in fact chronic obesity, reptiles are submitted to weather cycles that allows then to use stored fats (lipid’s). I do not wish to sound technical and boring, but I feel you need to understand the reason that got me to this point, therefore a little biology is required, Then I will tell you what changes I have made to my feeding and husbandry.

Gular fluttering;
All lizards do this when they reach optimal thermal point, as you know lizards don’t sweat nor do they expulse water via cloacae, in fact there cloacae is designed to reabsorb fluids. 90% of there water loss is from there breathing cycle, the rest is mostly from the eyes.

Lizards require energy for all of the physiological processes of the body, These include muscular activity, nervous transmission, growth and reproduction. This energy comes from the process of respiration, the chemical breakdown (oxidation) of glucose, witch produces energy, carbon dioxide and water. Glucose is derived from the basic foodstuffs, witch are carbohydrates, proteins and fats.

The principle of gular fluttering is to lower the brain temperature, in basking lizards once flutter starts the water loss is 6-8 times faster then at rest, this is why having a proper basking is important, ideally basking should be on one face of a vertical log, allowing the lizard to squirrel around and move out of thermal stress, I use 25w bulbs as they don’t dehydrate air moisture yet allow 130f basking at 8in, lizards don’t use this temp often, they will mostly perch near the bulb at there preferred temps, still the air isn’t dry and very little gular fluttering. When saving energy in this manner it can be directed into egg formation.

How those this compare?

Well our captives fed on high fats, these accumulate in the fat bodies rapidly, once they start growing eggs tow thing happens, first the eggs don’t get good nutrients as fatty foods are not mineral rich, this makes for both week eggs and female. Secondly the body cavity of these lizards is simply too small to handle both eggs and fat bodies at the same time, therefore the lizard will try to compensate by accelerating there metabolism to burn excess fats, this is a vicious circle because the female needs good nutrients and therefore must keep feeding while at the same time metabolise unwanted fats, from hear on her liver is over taxed trying to process all this empty lipids, the egg and fat mass is constricting her organs, blood flow is altered leading to farther complications. Of course we cant visualise all this when its happening, but now we can prevent it.

For my large carnivores Iv stop breeding rats and I now do only mice, smaller foods are higher energy, rats have a much higher fat content then mice.

I limit my insects to regular mealworms, crickets, earth worms, I feed these wheat bran and carrots only, vitamins and minerals makes up for whatever nutrients they lack.
Summer time I will feed grass, clover and dandelions to my feeders.

Egg producing females make better use of minerals then lipids, they develop eggs in times of plenty, therefore food must be abundant, abundance is reflected by smaller preys, other types of reptiles will gorge on very large meals witch they will digest a long time, but not tree lizards they need steady supply of smaller foods, otherwise its wasted energy.

To your question? Yes fatty liver can be at fault even if their was no more fat bodies, it only takes a few days to burn these if a female stop feeding or metabolises faster, this would tax the liver even more.

I remember from your photos, at on time your females clearly showed both full term eggs and fat bodies, lipid’s have no nutritional value, these empty fats weakens the immune system, the eggs and female have no resistance to bacteria, general septicaemia is a possible outcome.
rgds

Hears what will happen when feeding high energy foods, this energy will be effectively processed by the body, healthy proteins and minerals used to grow follicles while at the same time nourish a strong female, her eggs composition will be better balanced;
dry matter 30% water 65% shell 3% fat 5-7% protein 12% energy 10%
right now on a higher fat diet egg composition is 12-15% or more fat and protein and energy is lower. Changing your diet will balance egg composition and allow for strong healthy eggs. These will develop faster and be nested easier by an equally healthy female.

However filling up the fat bodies with higher protein and energy will take a little more time, no big deal when the outcome is strong healthy lizards.

So, are you saying that feeding the roaches, because they require a higher protien diet, is not good? Or do you agree that I should be able to feed a vegetable protein instead of the meat protein and have good results? I just can't afford to buy crickets and don't have the time to raise them. I have to think that the roaches are a good and natural food item for the dragons.

regards,
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Marcia - FroggieB Dragons
www.froggieb.com/MHDHome.html

I have limited knowledge on roaches, I only have hissers and none of my dragons like them, therefore I haven’t analysed there composition or nutritional value.

I think they are a good source of protein for any lizards.
However the term you are what you eat surly applies to them, feeding them dog food is like feeding dog food to your lizards no dough!

My roaches are fed carrots exclusively, but I will offer them clover, dandelions and grass this summer. If you feed a vegetal base dog food high in protein (Soya) you will need to starve your insects before feeding them to your lizards, 4-7 days without food should clear them of fat and chemical, Soya is the most chemically sprayed crop by farmers, especially Soya destined for none human consumption.

Though I still feel that crickets are the best insect food, I may have under estimated the value of regular mealworms, the fact that lizards feed less of them might actually be a good thing? Especially if the mealworms are fed a low fat but high energy food.
rgds