Whiteworms and Carotene Gut Loading

[kwarzym]

I do not think I am the first person to think of this, but I didn't see another thread in the whiteworms section about this, so here goes - if I were to feed my whiteworm culture sweet potatoes/carrots instead of bread, would that gut-load them with carotene to pass on to my fire belly newts? I realize the whiteworms themselves make no use of the carotenoids, but since they are eating carotenoid rich foods, it should still be present in their system, right? Is this worth doing? Or am I overlooking something, like whiteworms hate carrots or it makes them poisonous, etc?

EDIT - A google search found a previous thread about this, even though I couldn't find it using the forum search. My apologies...
http://www.caudata.org/forum/f1173-...g-whiteworm-natural-carotenoid-rich-food.html

 

[caleb]

You could feed them yellow corn meal (polenta)- it's got higher carotenoid content than sweet potato or carrot, and the carotenoids are ones that are more likely to help colour (zeaxanthin and lutein, rather than beta-carotene).

 

[jasper408]

I remember another thread where a member used a carotene supplement in order to gutload, found great success in the younger newts with belly development, and not so much with the older ones. I can't for the life of me find the thread again, but the supplement was similar to Repashy Super Pig- it had all the major carotenoids in it instead of just one or two. I think a major supplement to look for is one that includes astaxanthin, the red color found in salmon for example, and used with great success with dart frogs, reptiles, and fish. Some people even just used this carotenoid by itself (Naturose), to color up their pets.

 

[Coastal Groovin]

I always fed mine high quality fish flakes.

 

[erik3333]

I use colouring supplement for birds and it works great. I just sprinkle some over the whiteworms, wait 15 minutes, rinse and feed it to the newts. The bundle of worms will have some grains of the supplement.