The ever hungry tiger sals...

.... but just how hungry are they? They are usually fed a load of crickets (about 5 each) every day. The petshop was out and they went 3 days with no crickets. I fed them last night and this morning and still I saw one attacking the other.

I know they have terribly poor eyesight and more than likely the one just struck out at movement.

My question is - are they still hungry? They aren't skinny by any means so I know the number of crickets they're eating is good enough to maintain weight.

This is just idle curiousity. After the bite I fed them again, and I made sure the smaller one got several crickets by handfeeding him, leaving the larger one to hunt his own down. Am I going to wind up with obese tigers?

LOL I guess this stands out so much because my other tiger was a singleton. Raised by himself for years.

Sharon

I feed mine around a half a night crawler every two to three days. I have found that mine will stop eating after this amount. I suppose if I waited an hour or two and tried it again they might eat again.

Mine do not snap unless its been a couple of days since the last feeding and I walk into the room. They will start moving towards the glass and some snap at each other. This only happens once or twice. I have not seen it happen unless food is present or at least visible.

I think that Tigers are one of those salamanders that will eat and eat and eat if allowed too. You have to limit the food given to an certain extent. Because crickets are not exactly nutritious, the tigers could be eating more volume. That is just my two cents.

Hope this helps

Mitch

well I was more concerned with that they're quite small yet. Newly morphed I'd guess.

Crickets full time is probably not an optimal diet but their crickets are gut loaded and occasionally dusted w/calcium, earthworms, occasional moth and wild caught grasshoppers this spring. But for now their diet is crickets because thats all there is to eat.

Its always been my inclination to feed young/babies daily or even multiple times a day and I was just wondering if that was the right thing to do with these guys? I got my last tiger at what we'd call "full grown" so these are my first "babies".

Sharon

Hey Sharon,

I feed my tigers a nightcrawler per feeding, I let them tell me when they are hungry usually every other day. My smaller tiger is fed a couple of waxworms once a week also to help her put on some weight.
Occasionally when I buy crickets for my blue-spotted if I get a couple larger ones, I drop them in the tiger tanks as a treat for them to hunt.

Eve

Tigers are opportunistic feeders - in their natural environment, they never know when their next meal will be so they eat in bulk so to speak for fat and nutrient storage. In an artificial captive environment they continue this habit even though food may be plentiful. As the keeper you need to control food intake or yes, they will become obese. Young tigers are voracious eaters. In my experience as they age towards double digits they become less so. You will see them becomming fat and then it is time to back off of the feedings.

If you have an especially aggressive tiger(s) that snaps alot, you may want to separate it from the others....injuries of limbs/tails can and do result.

xMIDNIGHTx said:

Because crickets are not exactly nutritious, the tigers could be eating more volume.

Click to expand...

I agree with the rest of your post, Mitch, but this part isn't true. Well-tended crickets are highly nutritious. Their only deficit is that they are calcium-poor and should be dusted every few feedings.

Hi Thanks for the replies!!

In general one doesn't seem more aggressive than the other but I'm keeping an eye on them regardless. I'll keep on as I have they certainly haven't lost any weight since I got them.

The crickets are fed daily whether they're being fed to the sals or not. I clean out their container daily too.

When I got my first tiger sal he was bigger than my palm. These two are barely the length of my palm (about 4 inches) or slightly less than. They are a great deal more active than my old man sal. Who I think I'll drop a small update on right now...

Sharon