Weirdest feeding issue/story

Hello there!

This isn't necessarily a problem but more of a story... My beardie (Fred) has recently decided that he is not a fan of Rephashy's calcium powder. This concerned me as I am afraid of metabolic bone disease. I can feed Fred crickets without calcium powder and he'll chomp them down the second he sees them but the second it has calcium powder, it's as if he doesn't even know they're there.

Here is the weird part... I noticed one day a cricket with calcium powder started to climb the back foam wall, and Fred's gaze shot directly at it... I then placed him beside the foam wall and directed said cricket toward Fred and he ate it right away. Just to test this theory, I tried another cricket with calcium NOT on the wall and again no interest but then ate that exact same cricket on the wall after I moved him/cricket.

TLDR- My bearded dragon will only eat crickets that have calcium powder on them if said crickets are climbing the back foam wall in his terrarium and has literally no interest if those crickets are right in front of him.

Thoughts?

What color is the background in each case? If it's a lighter colored background, then he may be having trouble seeing them when they're dusted because it turns them white. (Wild guess.) :?

It seems to me that bearded dragons tend to use their vision to hunt, more than any of their other senses.

SHBailey":o71huenc said:

What color is the background in each case? If it's a lighter colored background, then he may be having trouble seeing them when they're dusted because it turns them white. (Wild guess.) :?

It seems to me that bearded dragons tend to use their vision to hunt, more than any of their other senses.

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I considered that as well but the ground and background colours are very similar so I feel like that isn't the case. This is only a temporary issue because I will be getting phoenix worms again tomorrow. Just thought it was kind of an odd thing I wanted to share

In that case, it could also have something to do with the angle at which he's seeing them and striking at them when they're climbing the wall versus on the floor, but now I'm really reeeaally guessing. :?

Beardies usually manage to throw you curves, just when you start to think that you've got them all figured out. :wink:

I understand that Phoenix worms are high enough in calcium that they don't need to be dusted, so if he likes them but is not too fond of the taste of the powder, that should help.