meal worms

[Yvonne G]

I have been having trouble finding meal worms for about the past month. I'm at a loss as to getting my hatchling eastern babies to eat. I've tried black worms that you get for aquariums, fruit, veggies, red worms (I refuse to cut up night crawlers), but without the meal worms, I just can't seem to get these babies to eat. So I did a GOOGLE search "feeding baby box turtles" and came up with a site where they said to feed them moistened water turtle sticks. What do you think? What do you all feed your hatchling box turtles?

Yvonne

 

[Itort]

My Floridas get red worms, aquatic turtle sticks, slugs, snails (slugs and snails collected on my place), soft fruits, and my bluetongue diet (a mix of greens,melons,berries,snails,krill,and low fat canned catfood). I'm not a fan of mealworms.

 

[Jacqui]

Here the hatchling Ornates normally start with the red wiggler worms, rolly polies (sp?), baby earhworms, phoenix worms, broken legged crickets, and a few meal worms. Sometimes I throw in a wax worm more as a treat.

Sorry never tried them on the pellets myself.

 

[evin]

yea mealworms have been gone around here too, only the small ones though our stores still carry super worms witch are big meal worms just get them and cut them in half

 

[Macheteslaststep]

There's an article about the mealworm shortage in this months Reptiles mag. Apparently the bedding/food that the mealworm farms use was tainted and has been killing all of the newly hatched mealworms, so no one has them. Just thought you'd like to know. They hope to solve the problem soon.

Sara

 

[Laura]

Looks like you are going to have to water an area and start digging!! I know they love compost piles.. so if you have compost or start a manure pile in your pasture and water it.. you should have plenty of food in no time!!!

 

[Jentortmom]

I don't use mealworms much if at all. I use red wigglers, wax worms, earthworms/night crawlers, crickets, etc. But the only place you might get mealworms is online, they are having a shortage as stated above. Also use fruits, veggies, greens, you can also use turtle sticks or a turtle brittle. I have a diet plan that I received from my vet after my boxie rescue came in, if you want a copy email/pm me.

 

[Yvonne G]

I don't use mealworms much if at all. I use red wigglers, wax worms, earthworms/night crawlers, crickets, etc. But the only place you might get mealworms is online, they are having a shortage as stated above. Also use fruits, veggies, greens, you can also use turtle sticks or a turtle brittle. I have a diet plan that I received from my vet after my boxie rescue came in, if you want a copy email/pm me.

The thing is, these are really, really small baby box turtles! and I don't have the heart to cut up a live worm for them. I'm pretty squeamish! Yesterday I went to Petsmart and bought a can of small mealworms. I chopped up nectarine and escarole and placed the canned mealworms on top. The babies were pretty hungry, and ate it all. I thought they might not because of the worms not moving, but they did! They got started on the worms and ate clear down through the fruit!! Today I'm going to see if they'll eat moistened trout chow.

Thank you everyone, for all your advice. I've raised baby box turtles before, and I always have trouble getting them started eating unless I can offer them something that wiggles. And the small meal worms are the only thing I've found small enough for them to be able to eat. I'll buy some red worms today and see if I can get them started in a pile of horse manure! Thanks,

Yvonne

 

[Itort]

I don't use mealworms much if at all. I use red wigglers, wax worms, earthworms/night crawlers, crickets, etc. But the only place you might get mealworms is online, they are having a shortage as stated above. Also use fruits, veggies, greens, you can also use turtle sticks or a turtle brittle. I have a diet plan that I received from my vet after my boxie rescue came in, if you want a copy email/pm me.

The thing is, these are really, really small baby box turtles! and I don't have the heart to cut up a live worm for them. I'm pretty squeamish! Yesterday I went to Petsmart and bought a can of small mealworms. I chopped up nectarine and escarole and placed the canned mealworms on top. The babies were pretty hungry, and ate it all. I thought they might not because of the worms not moving, but they did! They got started on the worms and ate clear down through the fruit!! Today I'm going to see if they'll eat moistened trout chow.

Thank you everyone, for all your advice. I've raised baby box turtles before, and I always have trouble getting them started eating unless I can offer them something that wiggles. And the small meal worms are the only thing I've found small enough for them to be able to eat. I'll buy some red worms today and see if I can get them started in a pile of horse manure! Thanks,

Yvonne

Yummy, though donkey dung is better. Makes em more stubborn and make boxies pull harder and get stronger. LOL If you are interested the omnivore gunk diet is on : www.reptilia.org/Care_Sheets/Lizards/csheets_liz_omnivore.htm

 

[Yvonne G]

Yvonne

Yummy, though donkey dung is better. Makes em more stubborn and make boxies pull harder and get stronger. LOL If you are interested the omnivore gunk diet is on : www.reptilia.org/Care_Sheets/Lizards/csheets_liz_omnivore.htm
[/quote]

LOL!! My daughter does have a donkey, but that's just what I need: a stubborn box turtle!! Thanks for the diet. I'll give it a try.

Yvonne

 

[ZippyButter]

I used to go to RAINBOW MEALWORMS ( in Compton, CA.) and buy directly from them, lately their stocks just died due to the tainted feed that they gave to these baby worms, and this happens to the industry all over this country. I don't know where do they buy their feed from? I asked but the workers did'nt know. I just wondered where the feed came from!!! Have you tried the frozen mealworms? and mix them with green and other things for the baby boxies? It seems that you have things under control.

Minh