Earthworms are a "regular treat"?

I see lots of info on-line about how to setup indoor worm farms, so this seems like a relatively easy feeder to raise potentially (plus you can use them for fishing!)

From everything I've read these are also quite a healthy food for dragons, I just don't see people talking about them much.

I'm thinking about basically setting up a dubia and worm farm and hoping that can pretty much take car of the protein needs, leaving me only really ordering feeders occasionally for treats.

Does anyone here have experience feeding earthworms to their dragon on a regular basis? Does anyone have a type of earthworm/night crawler that they recommend? Preferably something less slimy.

If you grow them on your own it should be fine because they aren't likely to have been digging around in contaminated soil with any harmful chemicals. The earthworms themselves are a healthy feeder from what I know of them but I haven't used them myself. I do have a roach colony and that works really well. You may even be able to combine them into one, using a bioactive substrate which is more natural for the roaches.

A lot to the indoor wormbins use red wigglers, which can produce an aversive chemicals in their slime. Some individuals find them very unpalatable.

Earthworms are high in moisture and calcium though and would make good treats.

If you can swing an outdoor composter BSFL are very easy to breed in the summer months.

Yeah, looking into this more it seems problematic.

It looks like red wigglers are the easiest to raise and the ones that compost food waste, but they make the maybe toxic mucus.

Nightcrawlers don't make the mucus, but they are harder to raise and only eat true dirt, which makes them more gritty as well and you can't really gut load them.

Hmm....

Looks like the a lot of froggers use red wigglers, so, not sure...

"Toxic" is a sliding scale from gross to deadly, and can be species dependent. I looked into worm bins too and the experiences seemed to point to dragons generally don't like to eat them but they aren't going to be health hazard.

You'll be hard pressed to "gutload" detritovores like worms and even BSFL simply because of their preferred diets but nutritionally they can still be a benifit to the diet. Dirt is after all rich in minerals that other bugs may not be eating. If you find a way to raise earthworms or night crawlers I think they'd still be find to include.

I'd forgotten about them, but something you could easily cultivate indoors would be isopods. They are crustaceans and incorporate calcium into their exoskeleton - some species have a Ca ratio of 16:1! I raise Armadillium vulgaris (rolly polly bugs) and Pepper enjoys snacking on them from time to time.
http://skies-of-salt.tumblr.com/post/128499326588/pepper-enjoyed-a-feast-of-isopods-today-they-come

A bit more effort and you can read silkworms, but they aren't a set it and forget it bug like isopods or roaches.

I think I'll order 25 red wigglers and see how he likes them. If they go over then I'll thinking about making a worm bin. If not then I'll release the extras into the garden.