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New to FBT's.. some info?

T

tynan

Guest
Alright fella's. I've been reading the board, but no one has mentioned what i should keep my meal worms in.. right now, all i have is crickets.. How can i maintain the crickets, how many mealworms can i feed them.. And also, i have a 20 gallon tank, with only 2 frogs in there. I have a 50/50 ratio of land to water, how many little Toads can i keep in there?
 
J

jon

Guest
I usually just keep my meal worms in the small container they come in, i just buy the smallest package since they are more just to add variety into the diet, not as the main food source because of their hard exoskeleton. Maintaining them for a period of time is difficult because they will turn into beatles. Make sure to keep them in the fridge as this will slow down their growth. If you do feed them these, give them maybe once a week, usually my toads will only eat 2 of the smaller ones before they just ignore them.

Crickets, you may wanna take a ride to your local petshop and they usually sell little cricket keepers that have tubes in them that the crickets climb up, it makes feeding a much easier task. I feed my crickets Fluker's High-Calcium Cricket Feed as this gut load won't kill the crickets after a few days like some other brands will. You must have a source of water for the crickets, but its best not to have a water dish as crickets aren't smart and will drown in the water. Fluker's does make a gel water with calcium and vitamins in it, but I haven't tried it yet. For now I just use pieces of fruits, such as oranges.
 
C

crystal

Guest
I truly don't think that mealworms are a threat as some of you may think.(this is just what I think)I never usally buy anything else but mealworms for all we have around here is crickets and mealworms,and its a waste of time buying my toads the crickets because my toads do not like crickets,and there not getting the food sorce they need.They only eat one small cricket if they must,thats like once every two weeks!They could die living off crickets,so really it isnt my fault that all I feed it mealworms.But I kept a fbt who lived 23 years and it never touched any other food but mealworms.Im not even sure if there supossed to live that long:S

Anyways,just keep the mealworms in the containers you get them in,and give them slices of potatos(it gives them food and water).You may wanna keep them in the fridge also like Jon said.
 
E

edward

Guest
Hi Jon,
The reason the high calcium diet isn't killing your crickets is probably because they are not eating enough of it to make a difference. You cannot offer any other food items (such as fruit) when you are offering a high calcium gutload as the crickets will preferentially eat anything else. You have to offer water only with them. In addition, calcium gut loads only achieve a suitable calcium to phosphorus ratio in pinheads. In all other sizes of crickets it increases the levels but not sufficiently.

With mealworms, I just culture my own. I use a 12 quart rubbermaid tub and a mixture of bran flakes and whole oatmeal. I produce enough mealworms that I cannot use them all (and freeze and then feed them to the birds out back).

I keep crickets in a 10 gallon tank with a small dish of ground dry dog food as a food source and use oranges for water. Depending on the size of the cricket I can usually keep them alive for several weeks to more than a month.

Ed
 
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