Does anyone use canned bugs?

[GreenFire719]

Hi guys, quick question here: has anyone used canned bugs to feed their box turtle? I’m taking Io with me to college (yay!) and the nearest petsmart from the college is about 20 minutes away. I’ve seen the canned grasshoppers and canned snails in their stores before and was curious if anyone has fed it. If so, what was their favorite. I can probably get some live nightcrawlers for her, just not as often as I would like to. If you have any other suggestions for a healthy protein let me know!

 

[Toddrickfl1]

In not sure if it's a good food for box turtles but I get big bags of dried mealworms and sometimes dried Earthworms for my water turtles at home Depot or Lowes. It's near the bird seed.

 

[Pastel Tortie]

Some of the commercial diets specifically marketed for box turtles include dried mealworms in the mixture along with plant matter (berries or peas or something like that). Make sure your box turtle is eating at least one variety of a good commercial pellet to make sure it's getting all of the minerals and other components it needs.

My boxie would eat dried mealworms and dried crickets as part of her diet when she was younger. That was before we added bearded dragons to our household. Now she enjoys live superworms from time to time. Superworms store well at room temperature, by the way.

You might try seeing if your box turtle will eat red wigglers instead of nightcrawlers. Some boxies don't care for them, but they seem to go over better if you transfer the red wigglers to another container for storage (not the small tub they come in) and gutload them. Rinsing them off and feeding them to the turtle in the water seems to go over better, too.

 

[Pastel Tortie]

IF you use a topsoil and coco coir kind of substrate in your box turtle's enclosure, AND you sink a nice big clay plant saucer down to the rim so your turtle can self soak, THEN you could just add the red wigglers directly to the substrate in your turtle's enclosure. When you lift up the saucer to empty it out and refresh it, the red wigglers will likely be congregating underneath. Before you place the saucer back, put bits of turtle pellets or greens under the saucer to feed (gutload) the earthworms. I know it sounds messy, but it might turn out to be an elegant solution. You might want to get creative to find a way to elevate the saucer slightly above the substrate so the somewhat moist substrate from the enclosure doesn't stick to the bottom of the saucer so much.

 

[GreenFire719]

IF you use a topsoil and coco coir kind of substrate in your box turtle's enclosure, AND you sink a nice big clay plant saucer down to the rim so your turtle can self soak, THEN you could just add the red wigglers directly to the substrate in your turtle's enclosure. When you lift up the saucer to empty it out and refresh it, the red wigglers will likely be congregating underneath. Before you place the saucer back, put bits of turtle pellets or greens under the saucer to feed (gutload) the earthworms. I know it sounds messy, but it might turn out to be an elegant solution. You might want to get creative to find a way to elevate the saucer slightly above the substrate so the somewhat moist substrate from the enclosure doesn't stick to the bottom of the saucer so much.

We already have this sort of system in her tank. She has topsoil and local leaf litter as substrate and it’s a bioactive tank with springtails, pillbugs (though not many cause she loves to pick them off), and both red wrigglers and night crawlers. I mix old food scraps under the soil for the bugs to take care off and in return they get rid of mold and are healthy for her to dig for and eat.

I can probably get some worms, I just don’t think I can keep them on hand at all times is the worry. Not that I need to feed them to her every meal, but it would be nice to have some on hand for treats.

 

[Yvonne G]

I chop fruit, veg and greens into a big bowl, then add the canned turtle food and canned crickets, etc. I occasionally offer live food too. My box turtles eat more fruit and veg than animal protein

 

[Tom]

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