Do you have a lizard but aren't sure you know how to feed it? If so, read on to find out.
Steps
Step 1. Identify the lizard
Different lizards eat different things.
Step 2. Get the appropriate food for the lizard
For example, green anolid lizards should be fed small to medium sized insects every 2-3 days. Food must be alive. Geckos eat mealworms, waxworms, crickets, and beetles.
Step 3. Follow the feeding instructions for your particular type of lizard
Method 1 of 3: Anolid Green Lizards
For more information read How to Care for Green Anolid Lizards
Step 1. Meal crickets
An anole will like having a cricket to eat; buy the smallest cricket that is offered and if there is only one "size" in one pet shop, go to another.
Step 2. Sprinkle the crickets with a powdered supplement with each meal, to make sure the anole is getting enough calcium and vitamins (anolides that lose key nutrients can suffer from metabolic bone disease, M. O. M
and die). If you keep crickets around in bulk, feed them vitamin-rich cricket food before feeding them to the lizards. In this way, all the nutritious food that the crickets have just eaten will, in turn, switch to the anole. Likewise, if the crickets have starved to death, your anole will soon be too. Anole puppies (you should breed them) will require micro crickets or small fruit flies.
Step 3. Give the lizard occasional fast prey, such as cockroaches or flies, to get it to get much of the exercise it needs
Step 4. Anolides may also eat waxworms, fruit flies, small worms, canned crickets, or earthworms
Step 5. Avoid giving mealworms to anolides
They can't digest them, wasting energy eating them and not getting energy from food.
Step 6. Place the food in separate quarters from the anolides' dwellings, unless it is time to feed them
This way the "leftovers" will not chew the lizard while it is sleeping and medium to large crickets may eat the ends of the anole. If you put the crickets in a shallow dish for the meal, make sure the crickets you put in the container don't hide under the food bowls and the anole will be thankful that they won't gang up on her at night! If they are small enough they probably won't disturb the anole, but some owners of anolides recommend never leaving the crickets loose in the tank with the lizard; rather, they should be placed in a separate container, moving the anole into the container for 5-10 minutes to eat and then returning it to its tank when done.
Method 2 of 3: Leopardine Gecko
For more information read How to Care for the Leopard Gecko
Step 1. Feed the geckos a varied diet on a daily basis
Step 2. Add as much food to the tank as the gecko can eat in 15 minutes
Don't leave crickets hopping around all day, as they will feed on the gecko.
Step 3. Mealworms, waxworms, crickets and cockroaches are all good food
Be sure to refrigerate the mealworms, as these turn into cockroaches if left at room temperature.
Step 4. Dust the meal insects with calcium + vitamin D powder
This is very important to ensure bone health (your gecko, like all reptiles, is vulnerable to all the most common and painful metabolic bone diseases).
Method 3 of 3: Uromastic Lizard
Step 1. The best part about uromastics is that they eat foods that can be obtained from grocery stores
Adult uromastics will eat a mix of dark green leafy vegetables such as Chinese cabbage and spring salad mix. Remember to remove the dark substance in the spring salad. Don't feed uromastics with romaine or iceberg lettuce! Lettuce has a very low nutritional value.
Step 2. Sprinkle turtle powder over the food to supplement it, and mix a sprinkle of juvenile iguana food
Step 3. Feed it once a day in a small bowl (remember to rinse it)
Step 4. Puppies require a higher dose of protein than adults, so give them a small amount of crickets every week
If you have a wild-caught lizard that doesn't eat, you'll need a vet to force it to feed (not as brutal as it sounds).
