New to the blue

[Renee]

Hi everyone im Renee. I just got my first blue tongue on friday. Im pretty sure hes a northern and his name is Cosmo. I read everything I could find before I bought him and have been using this site for reference. I'll post pics of him soon. I only have one question so far i found out he was only fed cat food at the pet store, I gave him some merrick grain free canned dog food on saturday and he loved it. Today I mixed in some chopped up berries and he wont eat it. Hes running around his cage and keeps going back to his bowl like he wants to eat but he just licks. I also gave him a meal worm the other day and he just killed it and didnt eat it. I know a healthy animal will never starve themselves but I was wondering if there was a better way to introduce fresh foods into his diet.

[Linnea]

welcome to the forum wait for the more experienced owners to help, in the meantime i can answer some things for you.

im afraid only half of the diet idea is right.
- berries are treats only, and not an essential part of the diet, should not be overfed (even if they look at you with those cute eyes...)
- mealworms are not good staple feeders due to their nutritional balance, same goes for crickets and superworms. if wanting to feed insects, roaches are great and simple. some here feed hornworms, silkworms too occassionally and theyre also good.
- you need to add veggies/salads to hid diet, usually. some only feed dogfood with veggies ocassionally and have healthy skinks with no problems at all, but it might be a good idea to try to introduce him to veggies at the very least.

chop up the veggies and the dog food in a food processor or by hand, tiny pieces. then feed. if your skink doesnt eat, wait another few days and give again. appetite building is seemingly the only thing that works when introducing new food to these "picky eaters" xD

in order for our advice to be proper we will need some more information from you, the skinks age and/or size. an adult skink can wait several weeks just to get their hands on exactly the food they like (but not normally the food thats "good" in large amounts....), whereas a very tiny baby should be eating heartily.

a younger skink (below a year) usually recieves more protein rich food(if feeding dogffod and veggies, the ratio of dog food should be higher)
an older skink (around a year or older) usually recieves a more balanced, opportunistic diet (either the only dogfood/veggie mix or dogfood with occasional veggies).

about feeding schedules, an adult skink eats three to one time a week, depending on the portion size, the skinks general appetite and behaviour (an exceptionally lazy skink wont eat as much, whereas a very active one might. some skinks are gluttons and some eat a lot only when they feel like it).

dont forget to add calcium with d3

btw - we love photos

[Renee]

Alrighty I switched out the berries for a chopped up salad mix mixed with the dog food. Hes taking a nap at the moment so we'll see in a bit if he likes it. Thanks for the help! heres a pic of my boy on his rock.

[Renee]

Sorry i got so excited that i figured out how to post pictures I forgot to write everything else Hes a year old and hes about 16 inches long.

[Linnea]

he looks great well sized, healthy round and with a pretty colour. definitely one with northern blood xD
nice basking spot too.

oh, be sure to look over the list of veggies not to feed and some that arent good to feed often.
not to feed:
- avocado
-rhubarb
- parsil and other spices alike
- onion

not to feed often or in large amounts, but not dangerous like that:
- spinach
- broccoli

remember blueys are hardy, so once is usually never dangerous. some of these are not dangerous to eat, but make it near impossible for them to process calcium and other vitamins well, which in lenghty use is bad. rhubarb and avocado and onion are all well known to be harmful to most veggie eting herps, so they are added to the list for blueys without experimenting.

i think most here love to feed different types of squash
im unable to buy squash for my bluey however, so i offer him (some examples) aragula salad, outdoor plants like dandelions (very carefully picked), and fresh veggies whenever i find them, a little bell pepper is always loved, i feed cucumber for treats due to water content.....and so on

[Susann]

Definitely a Northern you've got there, and this is nothing more than an observation, but from the picture it looks like he may at some point have lost the tip of his tail.
In addition to Linnea's wonderful advice, if you look in the FAQ section, there are lots of good ideas and suggestions on how to get a picky eater to eat, and what to feed.
Just remember, he is plenty old to go a week between offered meals if he is turning up his nose at healthy stuff! It is tough to do--for US--but a healthy skink will in no way hurt from going hungry for a while.

Just one point I'd like to make. Here in the U.S. when you hear SALAD, you are mostly talking about LETTUCE. There is nothing wrong with lettuce, it just contains so little nutrition that it is not recommended as a staple for BTS.
Linnea is in Sweden, and I THINK (correct me if I'm wrong Linnea) that when she says SALAD, she means what we call GREENS. SALAD is usually LETTUCES; GREENS is usually KALE and COLLARD GREENS and the other healthier more nutritious "leaves".

(Hoppas du inte tog illa upp Linnea!? ) Linnea and I are fellow Swedes, I just happen to live in the U.S.

[Linnea]

x___x waah, i keep making the same word mistake. susann is definitely right.

salad here is the same as greens, or a mix of them. so the same word, but it can literally mean any edible leaf. (apart from lemon leaves and such)

[iLoveMyLizard]

Its also important to remember that some foods dont have very good ca:P ratios (calcium:phospherus) so supplementing is needed and is essential. I use nutrobal, but there are many other vitamin and calcium supplements out there. Blueys and mostly all reptiles need a high caclium intake so they dont develope MBD (metabolic bone disease) and some even offer a UVB tube such as myself, however some consider these to be of personal choice along with supplements, however studies have shown that using just UVB can lead to MBD developing, so supplementing is essential and should at least be used twice a week, nut i personally dust all my liveffod and supplement meals every two feeds. The livefood i personally use are dubia roaches and silkworms, and use these as staple livefoods. Crickets are ok, but the nutritional value of roaches is far superior, and silkworms alike as opposed to superworms etc. My staple non livefood diet is turkey mince (used to be high quality dogfood, but found that there were too many things in it which i felt were enough to stop using it) and squashes (low ca:P ratio, so supplement) and lots of green, and dark leaved veggies.

Good luck with your bluey, and the previous advice is second to none, mixing veggies in with dog food certainly worked for me.

[Renee]

Thanks for all the help guys I really appreciate it

[LarissaLurid]

Alrighty I switched out the berries for a chopped up salad mix mixed with the dog food. Hes taking a nap at the moment so we'll see in a bit if he likes it. Thanks for the help! heres a pic of my boy on his rock.

Very cute skink! Also it's great that you are using Merrick dog food, very good quality. I use the same!

[skeetersmom]

Skeeter was fed only eggs, bannanas, straberries and dog food when I got him. At first, he didn't want anything to do with any kind of veggie, snails, or other things he should be eating.

Now, after around 4 months, he is taking his veggies (well chopped) with a little bit of dog food and snails. As snacks, he gets D Roaches..and if I am having a hard boiled egg or strawberry - he gets a taste.

At first, I thought he was never going to eat healthy, but thankfully I was proven wrong. I gradually lessened the amount of veggie camo (dog food).

Another thing I do is keep the list of veggies they should frequently eat (condensed from the large list on the caresheet) so I never have to rely on my memory when I am at the store. I also pre-make veggie cubes (chop up huge amounts of veggies - put in icecube trays, removing when solid, and putting in a ziplock bag that you can remove the air). They thaw out quickly,but just make sure they are not cool to the touch.

Very nice BTS you have there BTW

[Spindown]

lettuce is pretty useless btw, there is a GREAT food list in the FAQ like already mentioned...i've printed it off and stuck it on my fridge.