Afraid of crickets? Help

After wanting a beardie for over 3 years, I finally got one the day after Christmas. I bought Smaug (too early to tell, but I'll use him to make reading easier) at Petco because the nearest breeder from my house is over 3 hours away (I live in FL). The guy I talked to happened to be a beardie owner and talked me through the basics of owning my little dude. I had already pre set up the cage, made sure the temperatures were good and put him in. At the time I had sand but by the next morning I went back to Petco to get a carpet floor for fear of impacting since he kept licking it.
Well while at the store I bought crickets and dropped 5 small disgusting chirpers in the cage. Come to find out (after losing 3 in my room due to my own mistake) Smaug was TERRIFIED of them. His stress marks became darker, he threw himself into the glass walls and tried his hardest to get away from them. After that I put the rest of the crickets in my terancula cage (she's a cobalt blue beauty) and called it quits.
Since then I've been feeding him as many meal worms he wants, every day. There's always some in his little bowl just in case also. That, along with greens and wax worms, has been his main food source.
Now, after reading so many things about meal worms leading to impacting, I'm wondering how to get Smaug to eat crickets.
Please help D:

Try feeding him by hand. Hold the cricket between two finger and just put it in front of his face, if that doesn't work try feeding him his usual meal but sneak a random cricket in there, by logic he knows he's being fed so whatever is being fed to him he'll assume is food. That's the only idea I have for getting rid of his fear. Try feeding him outside his habitat too, line prefers to eat outside of his habitat. Good luck

Try smaller crickets, they may have been to big! He also is most likely still acclimating to his new home and the crickets just added to the stress factor.

Gormagon":3oo7p5fn said:

Try smaller crickets, they may have been to big! He also is most likely still acclimating to his new home and the crickets just added to the stress factor.

Click to expand...

Yep, bigger crickets than he's used to will be intimidating to a little hatchling. I struck the same when I upsized from small to medium crickets with Rex as a hatchling , I wound up handfeeding her and she soon become used to both being handfed and getting a bigger bug than she was used to (the breeder was feeding her and her siblings small silkworms and small (equiv to 1/4 sized (?)) crickets.

I find a good way to get the unenthusiastic hatchling to eat bugs offered by hand is to :
1/ squash the bug's head (this end if fed to the hatching first - they will taste the bug juices if you hold it firmly but gently against the side of the mouth
2/ pull off a hopper leg and push the thick meaty part of the leg between the lips before offering the rest of the bug but while while he's still chewing the drumstick.

Helps to offer only a few bugs at a time by depositing them in the tank/tub with the hatchling, large numbers of fast moving bugs will overwhelm him.

I also suspect if you only just got the hatchling. It's still suffering relocation stress and possibly is too interested in getting out of the tank to explore and maybe be with you (some are very people orientated from the getgo).

kingofnobbys":35hatios said:

Gormagon":35hatios said:

Try smaller crickets, they may have been to big! He also is most likely still acclimating to his new home and the crickets just added to the stress factor.

Click to expand...

Yep, bigger crickets than he's used to will be intimidating to a little hatchling. I struck the same when I upsized from small to medium crickets with Rex as a hatchling , I wound up handfeeding her and she soon become used to both being handfed and getting a bigger bug than she was used to (the breeder was feeding her and her siblings small silkworms and small (equiv to 1/4 sized (?)) crickets.

I find a good way to get the unenthusiastic hatchling to eat bugs offered by hand is to :
1/ squash the bug's head (this end if fed to the hatching first - they will taste the bug juices if you hold it firmly but gently against the side of the mouth
2/ pull off a hopper leg and push the thick meaty part of the leg between the lips before offering the rest of the bug but while while he's still chewing the drumstick.

Helps to offer only a few bugs at a time by depositing them in the tank/tub with the hatchling, large numbers of fast moving bugs will overwhelm him.

I also suspect if you only just got the hatchling. It's still suffering relocation stress and possibly is too interested in getting out of the tank to explore and maybe be with you (some are very people orientated from the getgo).

Click to expand...

Thank you both! When I bought the crickets I made sure they were small (and fit between his eyes) but I guess adding in so many the second day he was relocated must have been scary for him.. I'll definitely find some smaller ones and hand feed them. Had to do that with meal worms at first too.

You would be right in your thinking of him wanting to get out and explore/ snuggle. Most of the time he's at the glass wall just staring at me. he also already comes to my hand when I call for him. Such a sweetie.