Don't know when I caved

Swyft turned grey, extremely skinny, looked like he was going to die. I finally offered superworms and he has been eating those heartily ever since. I'd rather feed him superworms than have him die, obviously. I had tried all sizes of dubias and offered a different type of roach "death heads"? He wouldn't eat those either but my turtle was loving them. I really thought Swyft would go for a death head since they were so fast and active.

I bought a container of wax worms from petsmart, WHY DO I BUY FROM THEM. Dead. All of them. But the container of superworms was good this time, nice fat ones very lively. My regular insect guy wasn't available, I didn't plan ahead for my purchases over the holiday.

Swyft is now doing a first shed since the starvation period so I hope he pulls through. I am really frustrated, he always ate dubias when I first discovered them and I preferred them over crickets because he is free-range cup-fed. (he is out of a cage but the food is in a cup)

He is doing really well on his free-range area. He is staying in his boundaries now and loves his basking light, very active climbing all over his tree and poles, drinking well off the leaves, he is so great! I'm happy to see him getting better, I feel bad I pushed it so long with the dubias but I thought he was being stubborn. Still learning.

Comments

sandrachameleon
Glad you caved! Has it really been almost two months? That's a long time. He clearly does not, will not, eat those roaches! Make sure you gutload the supers well. Will he still accept crickets? Silkworms? Anything else?
 
K
I tried waxworms but they did not move enough for him, no interest. I am currently working on starting my own superworm breeding batch. I can try crickets again in a cup, he is free-range so I was staying away from the high-hopping-escape artist of crickets and he had really liked the dubias when he first tried them. Suddenly one day stopped eating them, I totally thought it was stubborness as I had read about food-strikes from elsewhere on the forum. I will try silkworms, a friend of mine was going to order in some different worms and I might try BABY dubias, see if it was the size. I would shake the cup to make the dubias move, turn them on their back so they would wave their feet as well, he would look the other way. Now, with the superworms, he perks up, climbs across the tree after the cup when I approach with it, showing him the worms. He practically climbs in the cup for them. Yesterday I tried a smaller dubia JUST to try, just to not give up now that he's had some superworm meals and is shedding. No response from him. I will keep trying other options though. I might see if he wants rolly-pollies.
 

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