I need a little help with a roach chow recipe. So far I ground up some dog food and oatmeal and i'm just wondering if the following would be ok to add to it?
Dehydrated Carrot (Made into a powder)
Dehydrated Orange peel (Made into a powder)
Egg shell (Made into a powder)
Celery (Made into a powder)
I don't think those ingredients would cause an issue on their own (but what is in the dog food?). I question the need for specific chows though. A dry chow won't offer hydration which is important. I've had good luck offering my roaches vegetable scraps with occasional fruit. They have thrived for years with this and they are quite helpful as kitchen composters.
You don't want to feed your roaches something that's too high in protein, which dog food can be, because too high of a protein diet is not too good for the roaches and not good for the dragon that eats them.
The other problem with a chow-only diet is that you will then have to separately hydrate your roaches.
You should be offering fresh greens and veggies to your dragon, so you can just feed the roaches the scraps/leftovers of those, which takes care of their food and hydration needs. Also, it gut-loads them with healthy food that your dragon will benefit from when he eats them.
Yeah that's a lot of protein. That may cause issues down the line. There have been a few discussion threads about that on here in the past. I'd be wary of the water gel too. I used to use it but stopped because I was concerned about the chemicals used for them. I've found that fresh veges (especially squash) and some occasional fruit are enough to keep them well hydrated. I just add leftover salad and kitchen scraps to the bin every day or two depending on how quickly they go through it.
I was looking for roach chow recipes today and one of them said to use a high fiber or whole grain cereal.
Would cheerios whole grain oats be a good choice for roach chow plus some ground oatmeal and carrot powder?
I'd probably opt for something less processed but I don't think it would be harmful. There isn't much sugar in there or anything else that stands out to me as a possible issue.