Okay so now all of the sudden my dragon is refusing to eat unless hand fed. For whatever reason I don’t know? I’ve never hand fed him until now. How do you get him to stop and eat on his own again? I tried to feed him for 3 days and he just wouldn’t eat at all. He was starting to look lethargic and dehydrated so I gave in and hand fed him and he ate?
I usually hand feed, unless it’s a hornworm. He hates crickets, turns his nose up on greens. He loves the grub pie.
I mix that with unsweetened applesauce & sometimes
Baby food prunes. I’ve got to give him water through the dropper. Mystic is 3 years old, but he’s still a baby. So I’m a dragon slave forever.?
It kind of depends on how old he is. If he is an adult (2+ years) he can miss out on his meals for quite awhile. He'll eat whenever he gets desperate enough. If he is a juvenile/sub-adult, you really don't want to skip feedings at all. I would suggest just trying a few different ways to offer the food. Mine kind of went through a similar phase. I would put his roaches in a cat food dish that they couldn't crawl out of, and I'd hand feed any that he didn't get ahold of himself. Eventually he got to where he'd eat about 5 roaches and then expect me to feed him the remaining 90% in the bowl by hand. It didn't really bother me so much, but I just didn't always have time to do it. So now, if I'm in a hurry I put a larger bin of bugs in his viv and place him inside of it. He seems to eat a lot more on his own when he has to chase them. You could also try different feeders, or just more interesting ways to provide them. Those feeder rocks that you can fill with bugs might be worth considering too. If he still refuses though, you might just be stuck hand feeding him. They can be really stubborn and really lazy when you let them get away with it.
My beardies have been hand fed mostly.
My Bluetongues get some handfeeding of treats.
My water skink was handfed for the first few months (is a wild skink who was found and rescued badly injured , heavily pregnant and near death) but she is now very active and assertive and prefers to eat at her convenience and to take food from the food dish.
Nothing wrong with hand feeding , is a great way to reinforce a strong bond with a lizard.
Guilty!
7 years of hand feeding 100% with live feeders. I’d say 50% hand fed with her collards and mustards - many times she will take pieces from my hand, and she will also eat them in a pile on her tile flooring.
I have hand fed every meal to Dezi since he was a baby. He is now 3 years, seven months old. He can eat on his own, but doesn't like it. I have the time, and we enjoy the bonding experience. However, we ran into a problem,when I had a serious health issue and was in hospital for over a week. My hubby could not get Dezi to eat at all. I was so worried! After that, I realized I needed to wean him and get him to eat some food on his own. Now, he eats a little on his own every day, and I have my hubby feed him once a week, so I will not have a starving dragon next time I am incapacitated. It was not easy to train him to eat without my help, but I consider it his health insurance! When he refuses to eat by himself, I let him go hungry, until he eats one meal. I would not do this if he were still under a year old, however, due to the tremendous growth rate at that age. Overall I believe that handfeeding is great, it is the best way to have a very tame, bonded dragon, and it is enjoyable to both lizard and human. Any thing that helps me spend more time with Dezi is a good thing!
I’m turning into a well trained slave. Biggs will only eat if I hand feed her now. We didn’t start by hand feeding but she says my training is in progress. :lol: I’m going on vacation for 12 days and I have someone who will be taking care of her but I’m scared she will get stubborn and refuse to eat so I am trying to get her to eat out of her bowl again but she is too cute and too stubborn.
I'm another one with an incredibly lazy dragon. I actually found myself picking her up last week and moving her over to her bowl of greens facing them to convince her to eat them. I nearly always hand feed worms and can't get her to eat them any other way. the only things I don't hand feed are locusts and even then she waits for them to hop over to her rather than chasing them. It doesn't help that she's currently shedding which seems to have made her even less keen on movement than before. It even got to the stage where i was dangling a wax worm in front of her then moving it away to check she was alright but that got her moving pretty sharpish!!
I have a bad habit - I hand feed all my 4 legged scaley children and have been doing it since I rescued Lucky the Water Skink.
I started with Lucky because he had a broken jaw and he couldn't handle solid insects - I was feeding him mealworm lavae and pupae guts and cricket guts.
Then I brought home George & Mildred as baby (2 month old) Bluetongue Skinks , and decided to hand feed them their crickets and worms as bonding ritual , this continued.
Only things they will eat without my fingers holding the stuff are egg, live snails, silkworms, and off cause their fav banana and mixed coloured berries.
Then I brought home Rex and Puff as 6 week old beardie hatchlings , and I continued the bonding practice , only things they would take without coaxing were crickets , silkworms, mealworms, beetles, moths and greens (loved buk choi) and treats like mealworms & superworms off the floor.
Then we rescued Wriggles , and I had to nurse her back to health , handfeeding her HerpaBoost by syringe at first, then when she was strong enough and interested enough , I'd offer mealworms, silkworms (small) and crickets by hand, I continued handfeeding most her insects but she liked to nibble at the softened mix of food processed veg and greens mixed with softened (soggy) juvi beardie pellets and vetafarm lizard pellets.
Finally we brought home Peppa and Toothless after loosing Puff, and I started bonding by handfeeding the first few crickets to each per day, and continue handfeeding Peppa (she's got me well trained and sits there on my tummy/chest and doesn't take much coaxing to open her mouth to let me pop a cricket or silkworm in her open mouth - she says "arr" when she's ready.
Then in November we rescued Fluffy and she was in really bad way - pregnant and infected lascerations on her back and infected tail stump. Again handfed - this them VetaFarm Reptile Critta Care by syringe for about a month to get help her recover and heal , then superworm and BSFL guts by hand , now she mostly feeds herself from a worm excape from glossy ceramic dish , but likes occasionally feeds of cricket or BSFL or BSF or mealworm lavae or pupae by hand....
So yep …. guilty as charged …. and I think my pets lizards enjoy it as much as I enjoy spoiling them.
I’m turning into a well trained slave. Biggs will only eat if I hand feed her now. We didn’t start by hand feeding but she says my training is in progress. :lol: I’m going on vacation for 12 days and I have someone who will be taking care of her but I’m scared she will get stubborn and refuse to eat so I am trying to get her to eat out of her bowl again but she is too cute and too stubborn.
Our Insect Based (75%) Meal Replacement Gel for Insectivorous Species of Reptiles and Amphibians. Great for Bearded Dragons, Skinks, Dwarf Monitors, Salamanders and more. Insects are raised in the USA on high-quality ingredients!
DIRECTIONS: Bring water to a boil on stove, in microwave or kettle. Pour boiling water into a bowl and immediately stir in powder (1 part powder to 2-3 parts water). Let cool or immediately pour into mold. Gel sets at room temperature. Cut into pieces or strips for feeding. Once made, gel should be treated as fresh food and can be sealed and stored in refrigerator for up to two weeks, or frozen.