Supplement Questions.

[Sparx]

I joined a Bearded Dragon group on Facebook to communicate with fellow Beardie lovers - and to get advise when needed. Well one day I was browsing fellow posts and noticed someone mentioned they gave their juvenile Bearded Dragon Calcium (with D3) dusted food 5x per week, then had their food plain for the other two. They were told not to give Calcium with D3 that frequently due to "overdosing" it and recommended giving Calcium with D3 2-3 days a week, plain Calcium 2-3 days per week and then vitamins the remaining days.

Now I have two juvenile Bearded Dragons (Sparx is roughly 5 months and Spyro is 4 months and 4 days old) and I've been giving them Calcium with D3 5x per week (3 feedings per day) and then Vitamins the other two days - and occasionally will skip a day or two and give them their feeders plain.

I've never noticed any adverse health concerns from giving Calcium with D3 that frequently - and I thought for young Beardies they needed it that often?

So my question is, for my two Bearded Dragons (again, they're about 4-5 months of age), what supplements should they be getting and how much, etc?

Thank you!

 

[Taterbug]

If you use high output lights (T5, MVB or MH) you can skip the D3 and use plain calcium - they should synthesize and regulate d3 naturally. This is what I do, and I give plain calcium on most insects. I do vitamins ~2x per week.

Some supplements do a better job though, the zoomed stuff advises how many dusted crickets per week per kg of body weight. Where into use D3 again I would do it like that, and dust plain of the majority of the remaining insects.

Calcium is what's super important to babies, crickets are very low in calcium and the diet would be very out of balance without the supplements. D3 is more of a hormone than a vitamin and it is responsible for calcium regulation among other things. It is very toxic in large doses, though most supplements provide doses that are small enough to not worry so much about imediate toxicity. However too much Calcium w/D3 supplement can allow excess calcium into the body and this can eventually lead to problems. Without D3 calcium that doesn't get absorbed just passes out with the wastes.

An really accurate doseing schedule would factor in the brand of supplement, how much they eat and what, the animals weight and possibly what lights you use. Most guidelines you'll find online aren't actually accounted for that way, the ones that use D3 more sparingly seem safer but aren't really any more scientific. That's why I got the T5 lights and shy away from D3 supplements.

 

[oatmeal]

Hello! Just wanted to chime in with my own experience... Like taterbug said, with a high UVB output light, beardies should be able to regulate their own D3 production just fine. And it is true that it's unlikely that a calcium supplement with D3 could cause toxicity, although it could be possible. A few years ago I switched to using repashy's "LoD" calcium supplement, as I wasn't comfortable cutting vitD out completely, but neither did I want to risk toxicity. They do have a calcium supplement with no vitD at all. I dust all my bugs/worms with this (low vitamin D), and have never had a problem (didn't necessarily have a problem with the other stuff either though).

As far as a multivitamin I use the repashy super veggie several times a week lighty sprinkled on salad. It smells lovely (like gecko food!), and my beardie loves it! This multivitamin also has Vitamin D and calcium, but I still use the LoD supplement with all insects. I might be wrong about this, but the "LoD" has vitamin D3 as an ingredient, which as far as I understand is a form of vitamin D with a higher bioavailability than what is in the superveggie. It could be that they both have D3 in them, and the labels are just different.

Complicated business, hey? Even now I'm always on the lookout for anything "better" that I could be doing for my reptiles. It's a lot of responsibility looking after a creature whose nutritional and environmental needs are so different from our own and other mammals.

 

[Taterbug]

Repashy strikes me as a reputable company for nutriton, the founder has written several pretty helpful articles about supplements and at the least he defends his formula/logic. Something of a rarity in reptile Products.

I might like to try the super veggie, since my guy is more into greens than bugs these days. The ingredients even sound tasty D:

 

[oatmeal]

Repashy strikes me as a reputable company for nutriton, the founder has written several pretty helpful articles about supplements and at the least he defends his formula/logic. Something of a rarity in reptile Products.

I might like to try the super veggie, since my guy is more into greens than bugs these days. The ingredients even sound tasty D:

Yeah that's why I went with it It smells like a fruit smoothie too! It makes salads a lot more enticing. You can also add water to just the supplement and add to salad like a dressing tasty!
I've been using it for years now, and I vividly remember noticing a big increase in her activity levels and appetite after I'd been using it for a while. I was sceptical, but apparently it's doing the trick! She turned 12 this year and will be 13 next April

 

[Taterbug]

Repashy strikes me as a reputable company for nutriton, the founder has written several pretty helpful articles about supplements and at the least he defends his formula/logic. Something of a rarity in reptile Products.

I might like to try the super veggie, since my guy is more into greens than bugs these days. The ingredients even sound tasty D:

Yeah that's why I went with it It smells like a fruit smoothie too! It makes salads a lot more enticing. You can also add water to just the supplement and add to salad like a dressing tasty!
I've been using it for years now, and I vividly remember noticing a big increase in her activity levels and appetite after I'd been using it for a while. I was sceptical, but apparently it's doing the trick! She turned 12 this year and will be 13 next April

Wow, 12! Congratulations your doing it right for sure