BSFL eat everything

[Steve A]

My veiled chameleon is a pain in the butt with eating. While I was on a fall vacation, I had our sitter feed him horn worms, which he loves. For the past two weeks he’s been on a hunger strike, except for horn worms. What a stinker.

Aw it sounds like he just wants to hold out for them lol hopefully he goes back to eating like normal soon.

Spike has gone on hunger strike from his silkworms and I simply re-introduced them at a tiny tiny tiny size. Very tiny.

He started eating them again and then I let them get bigger (as you know they grow pretty fast so this worked out perfectly) and now hes back to eating them pretty normal.

Although this last almost week now..... he's not eating normal.

1) I think a shed is coming on (although he usually eats through his sheds like normal!)
2) I've been upping cricket sizing for him
3) I now have more than a few BSF actual flies flying around in his enclosure each day

I think the BSF are the biggest factor. He seems to really enjoy going after them. Now he is barely touching his BSFL. Usually eats the silkworms but yesterday he only ate 1 out of 3. And hasn't been eating crickets quite as much either. He's eating pretty decent sized crickets now too though.

 

[Andrew1283]

In the end they will eat when they get hungry enough. I don’t know why I’m worrying. No one is skinny in this house!

 

[Steve A]

For me I am too weak. I try 'starving' Spike on Saturdays. Whereaas his food is setup by 6:35am on most days, I go in there around 9am on Saturdays thinking I am gonna make him hungry to eat from me.

He will stand there and just look at me until I place the food in his dish/window where it belongs I need to be waiting way longer but I just can't. Ugh

 

[Andrew1283]

For me I am too weak. I try 'starving' Spike on Saturdays. Whereaas his food is setup by 6:35am on most days, I go in there around 9am on Saturdays thinking I am gonna make him hungry to eat from me.

He will stand there and just look at me until I place the food in his dish/window where it belongs I need to be waiting way longer but I just can't. Ugh

Haha I have the same issue. Let’s build trust. OK you don’t trust me…. OK maybe I’ll make you hungry so you have to trust me…. OK just eat your food. Lol

 

[elizaann2]

lol no!! Any time I've tried superworms, both of my chameleons adamantly refused to eat them. So they didn't last and I had to destroy them, unfortunately. I think they were too big tbh (not physically when I fed them.... but I think preference wise for both chameleons).

I had no idea they did that though. Interesting! As Spike gets bigger I may try to re-introduce them.

My Jackson's doesn't want to have anything to do with them either. His fav feeders are BSLF, crickets, BSF, silks. And in that order

 

[elizaann2]

My veiled chameleon is a pain in the butt with eating. While I was on a fall vacation, I had our sitter feed him horn worms, which he loves. For the past two weeks he’s been on a hunger strike, except for horn worms. What a stinker.

Hahaha little stinker!

 

[CryptKeeper]

Yeah I’m always fascinated at how fast the eat through their gut load. That’s both really gross and also a little fascinating as well

What do you gut load the BSFL with? Dubia.com said they don’t need anything lol that they gut load them and need no food once I get them. Seemed a bit odd. But idk what to feed any of the worms. I feed the roaches and crickets dry powdered food and fresh veggies and fruit. But the worms I was told need nothing.

 

[CryptKeeper]

Wait, does everyone put their food in the night before!? I personally feed Spike every morning before he wakes up in the morning(but after his last misting). I do this because if I leave bugs in overnight, they'll get misted, which means the BSFL will just climb out of the dish and get all over. And the crickets will get their dusting washed off.

I am feeding BSFL, crickets, and silkworms. I use the window feeder for the crickets, and a dish for the BSFL and silkworms together. I haven't experienced any of these bugs eating other. So if it's possible, maybe feeding in the morning could be a solution for you for this?

I kinda wish there was a way for me to feed him at night so I had less to do in the morning before work

My guy doesn’t eat all at once. He picks through out the day so I leave them in there. Worms in a dish and crickets in a window type feeder. But I know now not to put BSFL in with any soft worms. So I’ll feed them now separate or with roaches they don’t seem to eat them.

 

[CryptKeeper]

Spike is......'learning' and when I am able to try feeding him on the weekends, he does this thing where he just sits there, doesn't get "fired up" anymore.... like he's content with me being there, but refuses to eat. The moment I drop the silkworms into the dish, he starts eating

And he's eaten from me before. He's a sassy little guy. Still gets fired up at times too, but lately it's kinda been like this. Unfortunately, during the week I have to leave by 6:40am before his lights come on at 7am. So I can't hand feed him anything during the week

Same here sorta. Rex used to eat horned worms feom my hand now he won’t. And he doesn’t crave them much anymore. I got them like 5 days ago and he used to go nuts for them but now there’s been one in the cricket feeder for days and some in worm bowl and he hasn’t eaten them. I think he got addicted to the wax worms when I fed him them for 4 days in a row. (Not just them I gave roaches and crickets too but he ran to the wax worms as soon as I dropped them in)

 

[CryptKeeper]

Oh they’ll eat dubia, too! I’ve had them eat sub-adult dubia overnight. Makes me a bit hesitant to feed them as larva after seeing that! Good thing the chams tend to chew them up well.

Oh wow I haven’t seen them go after the dubia or super worms but Geeze thats pretty wild for such a small worm to be able to consume those hard shells.

 

[CryptKeeper]

I mistakenly put some super worms in my BSFL cup and the super worms destroyed the larvae. I mean…it wasn’t the worst thing because neither of my chams will touch BSFL so then I fed them those super worms. Maybe my new high calcium superworm gutload!

Oh and also, does anyone else get so giddy when they see a white superworm that’s just recently shed and is super soft? Yoink! It’s your turn to be eaten buddy!

Omg the day I put the BSFL with the horned worm and they ate it I had a superworm in there too and it shed over night and I woke up to the horned worm eaten from inside out and a pure white superworm. I thought they ate his skin lmao until I saw the shell he shed from boy was it a weird morning

 

[CryptKeeper]

Do you guys keep a bowl for worms in your enclosures or put them in when feeding and take it out after? I have a dish the I zip tied onto branches and just leave it there and throw everything but crickets in there basically.

 

[Steve A]

What do you gut load the BSFL with? Dubia.com said they don’t need anything lol that they gut load them and need no food once I get them. Seemed a bit odd. But idk what to feed any of the worms. I feed the roaches and crickets dry powdered food and fresh veggies and fruit. But the worms I was told need nothing.

I get my BSFL from joshs frogs. I do not gutload them. They come packed in some dirt/whatever that I believe they eat and don't need to be gutloaded from my understanding.

 

[Steve A]

My guy doesn’t eat all at once. He picks through out the day so I leave them in there. Worms in a dish and crickets in a window type feeder. But I know now not to put BSFL in with any soft worms. So I’ll feed them now separate or with roaches they don’t seem to eat them.

This is how Spike eats. He picks throughout the day. He seems to really enjoy hunting lol so I love keeping black solider flies in his enclosure flying around / sitting on leafs.

 

[Steve A]

Do you guys keep a bowl for worms in your enclosures or put them in when feeding and take it out after? I have a dish the I zip tied onto branches and just leave it there and throw everything but crickets in there basically.

I keep the BSFL in the plastic container they come in all the time. I keep my silkworms in a plastic bin I bought from I think east coast silks(??).

when it's time to feed, I put them both into a bird cup that sits securely on Spikes branches.

I feed every morning. When I come home from work, I put remaining silkworms back in their home, and same with BSFL. Although with BSFL if they're turning black, I will put those ones in Spikes enclosure in the plant dirt so he can get more flies to hatch.

I also regularly throw a few or so BSFL in there like that in general for more flies.

I only put BSFL back in their plastic cup with the others if Spike doesn't poop in his dish (happened a couple times). If he poops in there I put them all in the plant pots.

 

[elizaann2]

What do you gut load the BSFL with? Dubia.com said they don’t need anything lol that they gut load them and need no food once I get them. Seemed a bit odd. But idk what to feed any of the worms. I feed the roaches and crickets dry powdered food and fresh veggies and fruit. But the worms I was told need nothing.

I gut load my BSFL with the same fresh fruits and veggies as my other bugs. Yesterday was sweet potato day for example.

 

[Andrew1283]

I gut load my BSFL with the same fresh fruits and veggies as my other bugs. Yesterday was sweet potato day for example.

They’re totally just maggots but I can’t call them that, because my wife would lose her mind. They’re “fly larvae” lol

 

[elizaann2]

Do you guys keep a bowl for worms in your enclosures or put them in when feeding and take it out after? I have a dish the I zip tied onto branches and just leave it there and throw everything but crickets in there basically.

I put my crickets in a Lunch Log. Silks, flies and moths I'll put on leaves or branches or hand feed, my babies seem to love to 'hunt' for their food. BSFL, supers and wax worms I'll put in the bird feeder cups I have. I remove all uneaten bugs about an hour before lights go out.

My Lunch Log stays in the enclosure at all times, the bird feeder cups I remove after empty for my adult panther and veiled. My Jackson's is still young and growing so I keep his bird cup full all day and remove it just before lights go out.

 

[elizaann2]

They’re totally just maggots but I can’t call them that, because my wife would lose her mind. They’re “fly larvae” lol

I told my mom, who was watching my chameleons while we were out of town for a week, that they were maggots and she freaked out. Hahahaha so funny....

 

[Steve A]

They’re totally just maggots but I can’t call them that, because my wife would lose her mind. They’re “fly larvae” lol

Same here, exactly. And tbh since I've begun handling BSFL many moons ago, I actually have a totally different view of maggots lol I actually prefer working with them over some of these other bugs.

Though I must say I am pretty lucky Spike likes silkworms (easy), crickets (easy but I am psycho and constantly clean them), and BSFL (NO maintenance).

nothing to gross or anything I don't mind touching if I need to.