Cup Feed vs. Free Feeding...

[Decadancin]

So, what about a discussion on the goods and bads of these feeding styles . Why do you choose the method you do and what works best? Does one work better for specific feeders you are using?

Any unique ideas that we should know about?

 

[CamrynTheCham22]

I used to free feed with crickets but they always found a way to escape and I could never tell if my cham was eating them or if they were getting out. same with the roaches that I have now. I cup-feed mainly but I also hand-feed half the time. I like it because when my cham knocks the cup over she can chase them, and I can be sure that she sees them and eats them. Nothing gets past her eagle eyes Or, should I say chameleon eyes since their eyesight is obviously the best

 

[nightanole]

I free feed soft bodies because they do not go anywhere. I "feeder feed" pre adults, just because they are bug vacuums, and its easier to introduce new feeders into the mix. Most adults are tong or hand fed, big feeders and they only eat a few a week.

 

[Mrjamwin]

I like to free feed because I think it's the most natural way. It gets my chameleon to move around and hunt just like he would if he were in the wild. Also, my Cam does not like it when I put my hand anywhere in his enclosure so I steer away from the hand feeding. The less stress I can cause the better and I like watching him hunt for his food.

 

[BuddhaBud]

We mostly feed silkworms & hornworms - The couple times we've let them free range, they end up pupated at the bottom, buried in the plants or in places our cham can't reach. Also, they're fairly expensive.. so when multiple worms evade our chameleon, it starts to add up.

Therefore, we cup feed - this way the worms can't hide & we can monitor exactly how many bugs our chameleon has eaten. He knows where to find his food & will even stand over the empty bowl, as if to let us know he's still hungry. Seems to be a good system for us

 

[jannb]

I cup feed and hand feed. I don’t like to free range the feeders because I’m afraid they will get their tongues wrapped around a branch and damage or yank out their tongue.

 

[Fiona's Mom]

I cup feed crickets and BSFL occasionally others. Lil Louie prefers his worms climbing on a vine, he also likes his discoids placed on the screen at the top of his cage so he can zap them up there. I let some BSFL turn to flies so he can catch them and recently got blue bottle fly pupae and let them hatch in a container in his cage a few at a time and fly so he can chase them. He doesn't like me in his cage much and will not hand feed.
Stinker.

 

[VerucaSalt]

I cup feed silk and Waxworms and free feed crickets,but am trying to develop a feeder system for the crickets so there's an elimination of escapees lol. I have seen the awesome PVC style feeders and am working on a smaller version of something similar.

 

[Remkon]

Why is hand feed not an option?

I feed crickets and dubia in a cup, but mainly crickets sometimes escape the cup so then it's free range...
But generally I prefer to cupfeed the staple feeders as there's a chance of a lot of em running lose in the cage eventually otherwise if the chameleon doesn't eat em all.
Besides it gives a good idea of what/if he ate.

Treats like superworms I hand feed as he takes it and I don't want them to dig in the soil and become smelly beetles.
Silkworms / waxworms I just spread out trough the cage to give him something to look for during the day.

Phoenixworms I barely ever have but I'd cupfeed them and they will crawl out when they get some moisture.
They will turn into BSF if they don't get eaten (and survive) so that's a nice extra

Stickinsects I free range feed.

Well you get the picture so no need to continue

 

[NickTide]

Dubias and bsfl are cup fed because there free feeding won't work. Bsf adults and stick bugs are free because cup feeding won't work. The few super worms i get are hand or cup fed. Horn worms which are a rare treat are free fed. If I could, I would free feed everything because in nature they don't get to gorge themselves at 7:15 and eat nothing the rest of the day. Plus is fun.

 

[VerucaSalt]

Dubias and bsfl are cup fed because there free feeding won't work. Bsf adults and stick bugs are free because cup feeding won't work. The few super worms i get are hand or cup fed. Horn worms which are a rare treat are free fed. If I could, I would free feed everything because in nature they don't get to gorge themselves at 7:15 and eat nothing the rest of the day. Plus is fun.

How old/large are your Chams, and how often do you feed the stick bugs? I'm very interested in attempting to grow a colony of these/leaf bugs/mantis or perhaps all 3, but don't often hear others using these as a diverse feeder.

 

[NickTide]

My panther girls are about a year old. I dont feed the sticks often because I am still learning how to raise them. I lost most of my nymphs because as a winter feed I saved dried oak which they wont eat. Luckily, I had two nymphs live, grow and lay eggs before they died and there were still eggs hatching from my last adults (died over winter) when the wild rose started popping. Next year I will keep a wild rose under lights, keep dried rose and raspberry branches and keep rose and raspberry branches (in water) in the fridge and garage as long as possible to try to keep the life cycle going. I have Giant Vietnamese sticks. They dont eat Ivy. I am considering switching to a species that will but they are so much fun.

Chams love them. At one point, all I had available were dubias and it was going to take several days to get more bugs when one cham decided she didnt like dubias anymore. I fed sticks for two days and she started eating dubias again. I soon had other bugs arrive in the mail.

They are harder to feed in mass. I have to capture one or two at a time with a cup, pour them into another cup (they cling for dear life) put the lid on the second and repeat. Then I take the cup up to the chams and open the lid and just put the whole cup in there.

The eggs take months to hatch so even if you think you lost your entire culture, just wait and see if eggs continue to hatch.

Growing and breeding mantids is very hard. Hatching mantis oothes is easy.

 

[JacksJill]

Crickets and roaches get cup fed. Silks and horns get hand fed or placed on branches. Superworms which are like crack to my guys get hand fed to build trust. I use the cup and hand feeding to track appetite. I also don't want feeders eating or running thru poo and increasing my chameleons parasite load.

 

[somerandomband]

The very few and occasional meal worm is usually cup or hand fed to our girls, but crickets are free fed. we let dubias free feed our babies or put them in a dish. Carmen gets very bored and paces her cage if she doesn't get to hunt for the day. If I put her crickets in the bowl she eats them all and then looks at me like wth hooman are you serious? So I let em' go all over. Carmen prefers to be left alone but if you have a food item in your hand she quickly re-considers her solitude .
Loretta enjoys eating collard greens almost as much as eating bugs. Loretta is happier to have crickets in her bowl instead of having to find them. She also very much enjoys running onto your palm the second you open her cage to feed her

 

[Boygeorge27]

Shere khan loves being cup fed