preventing pinworms?

[sheri85]

i was trying to find info on pinworms, and know that beardies get them from crickets, but i can't find any info on how to prevent them. is it how you care for the crickets, or is it just sort of random? i'm trying to switch my beardie to reptiworms as his go-to feeder, but i still have a lot of crickets left.

 

[Gail]

It depends on whether or not your crickets have pins when you get them and that seems to be pretty random. I don't feed crickets any more but when I did, I would feed them panacur paste, I don't know if it actually helped but it certainly didn't hurt. I also give my dragon panacur every other month as a preventative.

 

[sheri85]

thanks for the response! i was pretty curious about it since i've seen it pop up in messages, but didn't know if it was a random thing or not.

 

[FBradshaw]

Your best bet for avoiding getting any parasites from feeders is to look closely at them in the pet store. If you see lots of dead crickets, or the crickets enclosure is not kept up with properly I would suggest finding a new source. Repti-worms or Phoenix Worms, both are actually black soldier fly larvae, are a much safer and healthier alternative to crickets.