What wild caught food is toxic?

Before I would only catch grasshoppers but now that I live in new orleans there are about 4000 species of insects about. Are there any in particular I should stay away from? Yesterday I caught varius types of grasshoppers, leafbugs, dragonflies and all sorts of little nats. I got One really strange looking bug that I threw out.

Thoughts?

So I looked and there are lots of threads like this with few real answers. So maybe we should make a list of known non toxic wild insects. Lets not get into the parasites/pesticides discussion as it has been covered. I will try and keep this list on the top and edited as additons are made. I take no credit for all the additions, I will just add them as they come on for forum.

Non Toxic
Praying Mantis
Cicadas/katydids
Field Grasshoppers
RollyPollys
Dragon Flies
Leaf hoppers

Mayflies

Termites
Earthworms

Toxic
Monarch butterflies
ladybugs
lubber hoppers

horn-worms(if eating tomato plants)
fireflies

Box Elder Beetles

lubber grasshoppers
assassins bugs
centipedes
hairy caterpillars
milkweed bugs
bees or wasps-Unless stingers removed.
spiders
some butterflies & moths
isopods(heavy metal accumilators which can be harmful to chams)
& pretty much any insect with RED, YELLOW, and/or BLACK (these are warning colors)

Monarch butterflies are toxic. So are ladybugs and lubber hoppers. Im no entomologist. Thats why I mostly feed grasshoppers and katydids and stick bugs for wild caught treats. Maybe someone with more bug knowledge will give more input.

wild-caught:
horn-worms
lady bugs
fireflies
lubber grasshoppers
assassins bugs
centipedes
hairy caterpillars
milkweed bugs
bees or wasps
spiders
some butterflies & moths
isopods(heavy metal accumilators which can be harmful to chams)
& pretty much any insect with RED, YELLOW, and/or BLACK (these are warning colors)

some of these bugs are poisonous/venemous
but are still fed commercially

why??........ because some of them accumilate
their toxins from their wild food source

some of these bugs wont harm your cham such as
a bee/wasp because I have read that some chameleons
can eat them without being stung

but I do not recomend collecting them under no circumstance to feed them
to feed to your cham

Bees are certainly non-toxic. They CAN be one of the best wild feeders to feed off. But you have to pin them first and remove the stinger. A pain in the rear but they are relished by chams.

I put bees in the list because of their stingers
but other than that they are ok to eat

this list was mainly for the newbies so
they dont make a mistake of feeding off these
feeders without knowing their consequences or risk

wow, I dont think I would go out
collecting bees and pull off all their stingers
to feed to my cham thats alot of work

but I bet your chams sure appreciate
it and they get fresh bee pollen in their diet

Ive caught a few by mistake mostly. I just put em in the fridge like i do my hoppers to let em go into a hibernation type mode. Thats gives you a few min to work on em before you toss em in the cage. I prefer to feed mostly hoppers. I wish I could catch more dragonflies. But those are a pain to catch. My chams love them. For those that are scared to feed wild caught. You should see a cham thats only had crickets and worms go after a hopper or a dragonfly. Its like a kid getting to go eat baskin robbins.

haha I can relate to that cause I am always excited to go to baskin robbins

I wish there was some species of bee that doesnt have stinger
I would really love to feed them off

lubber grasshoppers are also non-toxic if fed on a
captive diet and are one of the only hoppers who willingly breed
in captivity

I was actually researching how to breed hoppers. Its gettin too dang hott down here to go out collecting. I got a good link sent to me showing how to set up a breeding tank. I just dont know where or how I'd set it up to prevent escapes. I could just see 100-200 hoppers flying all over my house.

So are wild caught horn worms toxic because they might have eaten a tomato plant?

We have thousands of dragonflies here and they are suprisingly easy to catch with a net.... Most of them are still to big for my little guy though.

I couldn't imagine what a colony of grasshoppers would do if it escaped in your house, it would be biblical.

Also how do you identify a lubber hopper?

yes hornworms are toxic if they eat tomato plant
I thin it was due to a really high concentration of Vit. A

I am no sure it was something that
just came up in my head

but i know they are toxic if they eat tomato

lubber grasshopper
http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/orn/lubber.htm

Great pics there. Im lucky Ive never caught any lubbers at the spot where I go collecting. According to the map of their range I should see some here in Texas.

Remember: Some wild caught insects are only toxic because of what they eat - in the wild.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/if-lubbers-poisonous-why-they-menu-41208/?highlight=lubbers

Im not so sure its that they are poisonous. But they excrete a foul tasting foam from their thorax that would be unpleasant to say the least to our chams.

Syn, those are dead hoppers on that menu I believe.

Texas Panther Man said:

Syn, those are dead hoppers on that menu I believe.

Click to expand...

Yes, but...

Lizardlover said:

When raised in captivity they are not poisonous or noxious. They are like dart frogs, when they dont have their natural diet, in the lubber's case, poisonous lilies, they loose their toxicity. As a matter of a fact, they are my new feeder project.

Click to expand...

I wouldnt think changing their diet would affect whether they excrete a nasty tasting fluid.

Lubbers?

I am very interested in this thread because I just started a breeding project with katydids, grasshoppers and giant Katydids. So far I wasnt succesful but they are hard to breed anyway. But I keep doing it.
About the lubbers, I have one grasshopper in my collection box for a week now what is the only one who has a red tummy. The legs are vertically striped. I still dont know if this is a lubber. THese lubbers have so many different appearences its hard to identify for me. The best and safest hoppers are the gray looking I guess they call them Carolina Hoppers.
Didnt I see a post from this mantis breeding guy who has a facebook page for his mantis, chameleons and other insects he breeds, he posted that he is breeding the lubbers. I didn't wanna post anything about it because I didn't wanna look stupid. maybe somebody else can check this out.
Oh and I keep my collection in 3 different containers and fishtanks on the back porch. They like it hot and in my house it would be too cool. I live in south TX.
I sweat it out every evening, when I go to feed the horses, I always go with net and cups to catch some. I am kinda obsessed with them, lol. They are such super feeders and I miss it to buy them in the petstore like I did in Germany.
They are easy to keep and not as nasty as crickets and the big ones are not as jumpy either. I wouldn't mind if they escape in my house. Its freaking me out more with crickets and roaches.
What are you guys feeding your hoppers?

Texas Panther Man said:

Bees are certainly non-toxic. They CAN be one of the best wild feeders to feed off. But you have to pin them first and remove the stinger. A pain in the rear but they are relished by chams.

Click to expand...

No pun intended lol

very informative thread

Ants are toxic aswell right?