BLUE TONGUE SKINKS

Would a reptile multivitamin be something to look into to make sure that Sophie is getting all the nutrients she needs? Or maybe calcium?

You will find a wide varity of opinions on that subject. Some believe with the proper diet supplements are virtually unnecessary. Others use them regularly. Check out the care sheet and do a search for past threads and you will see the vast spectrum of opinions. I feed vitamin supplement once per week and calcium a couple of days per week as my skink is just under 4 months old. I am careful to feed collard greens and other high calcium foods on a regular basis and follow the caresheet pretty closely feeding organic foods. I would vote for having them in the house.

It depends on your diet. A diet high in mice would not require calcium supplementation. A diet high in veggies probably will. A diet high in crickets, mealworms and superworms should, but a diet in silkworms probably does not.

To be safe, I use calcium with d3 occasionally. I don't use a multivitamin, as I think hi diet is varied enough. In addition, multivitamin can be easily overdosed, whereas straight calcium really cannot, although d3 can...


Best to do a lot of research and form your own conclusions.

NomadOfTheHills wrote:It depends on your diet. A diet high in mice would not require calcium supplementation. A diet high in veggies probably will. A diet high in crickets, mealworms and superworms should, but a diet in silkworms probably does not.

To be safe, I use calcium with d3 occasionally. I don't use a multivitamin, as I think hi diet is varied enough. In addition, multivitamin can be easily overdosed, whereas straight calcium really cannot, although d3 can...


Best to do a lot of research and form your own conclusions.

Don't forget though that a diet high in mice is not a good diet, and that small mice may not have sufficent calcium because their bones are still forming. And also remember that collards have more calcium than practically any food we feed..it's ratio to phosphorus is crazy! Something like 15 parts calcium to 3 parts phosphorus.

I only use calci dust on the superworms, he'll eat them like jelly sweets, so it makes the nutrition value right. If there's an abundance of snails the shell does it for me, also a suggestion from a while back was to keep all the eggshells you use and grind them up to dust and use.Too much D3 and uv is bad for them

Zach wrote:Don't forget though that a diet high in mice is not a good diet, and that small mice may not have sufficent calcium because their bones are still forming. And also remember that collards have more calcium than practically any food we feed..it's ratio to phosphorus is crazy! Something like 15 parts calcium to 3 parts phosphorus.

I don't know, I think mice are better than chicken and such, the bones and organs make it a complete meal.

I agree with the collards though, and I use them often. The thing is using fresh veggies, you don't know how many nutrients have leaked out. In this regard, frozen can be better.

wait, how can frozen be better now?

I'm not sure about the mice -- with chicken, you're feeding solid protein pieces of meat. Mice have very little meat, and as I understand it, very high fat. I believe a diet of lots of mice would lead to a very fat skink. It's what I feed mine if they're looking a bit thin too.

Right, chicken is just all protein.

Mice, however, have vitamin rich organs, and calcium rich bones. They really aren't that high in fat, but higher than chicken? Yes. Thats why I don't feed a lot of mice, it only makes sense that a richer source of vitamins and nutrients would need to fed in less quantity.


Frozen, is almost always better than fresh vegetables, unless you get locally grown, organic.

Frozen vegetables are flash frozen to preserve all the nutrients, and most produce sitting on the shelf at the grocery store lost much of its nutrition, as it was picked a long time ago (could be weeks).

Snails are a far better source of protein... something like 97% protein on a dry matter basis...

Yea, but where are you going to get that many snails?

28oz of canned escargot snails for $6... not cheap, but oh well.

http://www.amazon.com/Ambrosia-Snails-E ... 651&sr=1-3

The nutrient composition of raw snails (per 100 grams of edible portion), according to information from the nutrient databank of France, is:


Energy (kcal): 80.5
Water (g): 79
Protein (g): 16
Available carbohydrates (g): 2
Fibres (g): 0
Fat (g): 1
Magnesium (mg): 250
Calcium (mg): 170
Iron (mg): 3.5
Vitamin C (mg): 0

I go through a lot of snails for my pink tongues... trying to break it up with some Wellness Core reduced fat dog food... Innova Evo reduced fat dog food is awesome as well.
These are dry foods.
I vary what I use to moisten them, lately I've been using low sodium beef broth.
I've also tried to make a broth with the snails... I freeze unused portions of snails, and I defrost them by boiling them in water, which I reuse to moisten the dog food. That's of course for my pink tongue skinks, which naturally are attracted to snails.

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Innova EVO Reduced Fat Dog Ingredients:
Turkey, Chicken, Chicken Meal, Turkey Meal, Potatoes, Herring Oil, Natural Flavors, Egg, Tomatoes, Apples, Carrots, Garlic, Cottage Cheese, Alfalfa Sprouts, Potassium Chloride, Vitamins/Minerals, Dried Chicory Root Extract, Ascorbic Acid, Lecithin, Rosemary Extract

Innova EVO Reduced Fat Dog Guaranteed Analysis:
Protein 52.5%; Fat 15.0%; Moisture 7.5%; Linoleic Acid 2.29%; Omega 3 0.59%; Fiber 1.54%; Ash 11.3%; Calcium 3.07%.

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Wellness CORE Reduced Fat Ingredients:
Deboned Turkey, Turkey Meal, Chicken Meal, Potatoes, Dried Ground Potatoes, Pea Fiber, Whitefish Meal, Tomato Pomace, Natural Chicken Flavor, Chicken Liver, Salmon Oil, Flaxseed, Carrots, Sweet Potatoes, Kale, Broccoli, Spinach, Parsley, Apples, Blueberries, Vitamins, Minerals, Choline Chloride, Chicory Root Extract, Yucca Schidigera Extract, Glucosamine Hydrochloride, Chondroitin Sulfate, Lactobacillus plantarum, Enterococcus faecium, Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Mixed Tocopherols, Rosemary Extract.

Wellness CORE Reduced Fat Guaranteed Analysis:
Crude Protein minimum 33.0%
Crude Fat minimum 9.0%
Crude Fiber maximum 8.5%
Moisture maximum 10.0%
Vitamin E minimum 500 IU/kg
Omega 6 Fatty Acids* minimum 2.2%
Omega 3 Fatty Acids* minimum 0.50%

Hey Steve,

Are there any preservatives in those canned snails? Can you post label contents?

off the top of my head-
water, spices, ascorbic acid (vitamin c)

I rinse it off before serving.

I'll post the order of ingredients next time I get in a can. They ship from NJ so I get them next day even when paying for ground shipping.

Thanks Steve.

Steve wrote:28oz of canned escargot snails for $6... not cheap, but oh well.

Haha, my skink is not eating escargot. Not cheap means not getting bought.

But aren't the ones in the can missing their shells?

Looks like it on the label. I am also not chuffed about the fact that they are cooked, spiced and preserved. Think I'm gonna stick to the live variety.

Jenn wrote:But aren't the ones in the can missing their shells?

Yes, but if you look at the data I provided for snails, it's the edible portion (i.e. no shell).

Live snails are more expensive and more likely to carry diseases that could potentially be transmitted to your skinks. If you're getting them from outside they also could have toxins in their system, so you'd have to wait a few days before feeding.