Food question for Tiger salamanders

I have a food question. My tiger salamander larvae just finished changing and are now in the process of growing out. I have bought several cans of crickets and several batches of live crickets. Paying those prices has gotten old quickly. My question is would it be possible or acceptable to buy crickets in bulk or breed them and freeze them in smaller portions to be used. I would of course defrost them before feeding. Would this work or do they have to be live to be healthy for them? I was honestly thinking of breeding them myself so I know what they have eaten, then freezing them.

Also do salamanders need their food dusted with calcium the same way reptiles do? Thank you for the help.

Edit to add... I am sorry about putting this in the wrong place. All of the forums here are a bit confusing to me still. This should have been posted in the beginners section.

Your best option is to avoid all of the hassle that comes with feeding crickets and make nightcrawlers the main stay of their diet. Crickets are only good for treats of you ask me. Just remember that they still need to be gut loaded and dusted with calcium before being fed to your salamanders. One advantage with worms is that you don't need to dust them with calcuim or vitamins.

Greatwtehunter said:

Your best option is to avoid all of the hassle that comes with feeding crickets and make nightcrawlers the main stay of their diet. Crickets are only good for treats of you ask me. Just remember that they still need to be gut loaded and dusted with calcium before being fed to your salamanders. One advantage with worms is that you don't need to dust them with calcuim or vitamins.

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Well that would be a good thing since I already raise worms for my Oscars. I'd still like to know what everyone thinks of the freezing idea for crickets though. I have many different pets besides the salamanders that could have them added to their diet.

I personally would not suggest freezing crickets for your Tiger Salamanders, for a couple key reasons. The first is that getting your Tigers to eat frozen crickets could be a challenge in and of itself; my own Tigers don't even blink at food if its not moving so you might have trouble getting them to eat. Secondly, I know that food tends to lose nutrients if it is frozen, and because crickets are already lacking in some nutrient departments, freezing them might make them even less nutritious. Personally, I'd say if you do choose to freeze crickets, do it for your other animals and not for your Tigers. They'd much prefer worms, as Justin has said!

If you are dead set on using insects, I'd personally suggest feeder cockroaches. I use the Orange Spotted Roach (Dubia Blaptica) to feed my Tigers, and they seem to love it! Again, freezing cockroaches is probably not the best solution, but the insect is easy to breed, doesn't smell, and most of all they can't climb, so I find them to be a great source of food for my salamanders. Just a thought!