DIY Gut Load: How to Make Nutrient-Dense Feeder Food
Part of the reason we love reptiles so much is how wild they are. They’re not domestic animals, like dogs or cats. They’re exotic little critters that just so happen to be perfectly happy if you give them enough space, sun, and the right kind of nutrition. But the balance of nutrition your pet might get in the wild is a little hard to replicate at home, where they subsist on a smaller list of food items. That’s why you need to help them round out their diet by gut loading their feeders.
In this article, we’ll talk about why gut loading is important, how to do it, and how to make your own super-nutritious gut load mix. Let’s dive in.
Why You Should Gut Load Your Feeders
There are pros and cons to domestic life for a reptile. On the one hand, eating a steady diet of home-grown roaches, they’ll never get a nasty parasite. On the other hand, they’re not getting as much variety as they might in the wild.
Reptiles have different needs, and no single food source will fulfill them all. That’s why you need to give them as much variety as you can and bump up their nutritional content by gut loading them.
In a nutshell, gut loading means filling your feeder insects up with a super nutritious mix of vital nutrients and minerals. Then, when your pet eats one, those nutrients pass directly to them.
Gut load mix contains a lot of good stuff (depending on what you make it with), but the main ingredients are calcium, vitamin D3, B vitamins, extra protein, minerals, beta carotene, and essential amino acids.
How to Gut Load Before Mealtime
Gut loading is pretty easy. The basic idea is this. You pick out a handful of feeders to give your pet in the next 24 hours and feed them gut load mix. The feeders ingest the good stuff, and it sits in their stomachs.
Then, when it’s mealtime, you give the high-powered feeders to your pet. The bonus nutrients get passed along, and everybody’s happy.
Some pet owners will still dust their feeders even when gut loading them, just to make sure their pets get everything they need. Whether you choose to depends on what kind of reptile you have and what kind of feeder you’re using.
Which Feeders Can I Gut Load?
Easy answer on this one. You can gut load just about any feeder; dubia roaches, crickets, mealworms, superworms, black soldier fly larvae, and discoid roaches. Insects love gut load mix for the same reason your pets do - its high nutritional content is irresistible.
Reptile Nutrition Needs
Different reptiles have different nutrition needs, and it’s always worth going over them when we talk about improving your pet’s diet. Without getting too nitty-gritty, this is what your pet needs to be healthy and happy.
Bearded Dragons
Beardies are omnivores and do best on a mix of insect protein, leafy green veggies, and fruit. The ratio of protein to veg changes as your beardy ages, with juveniles needing the most insects and old beardies getting by mostly on plants. Beardies mostly like lean protein, but a fatty protein snack here and there is great for them.
Leopard Geckos
Leopard geckos are carnivores, but they still need lots of variety to stay healthy. It’s wise to supplement their main feeder with other kinds of insects from time to time, so they can enjoy different foods. They need a mix of fat and protein, which you can easily satisfy by giving them a lean protein for their staple food and a fatty protein as a “treat”.
Veiled Chameleons
Veiled chameleons are mostly carnivores, but they like the occasional treat of fruit and also enjoy small doses of greens (collards, kale, etc.). They do great with a primary food source like dubia roaches or hornworms as their primary food source, with fatty superworms as special treats.
Pacman Frogs
Pacman frogs will eat just about anything (just like their namesake). They are voracious carnivores whose dietary preferences grow with age. As juveniles, they do great on feeder insects like mealworms, dubias, and red worms. As they get older, they will move on to bigger prey like pinkie mice. Adults will take full grown mice and even baby rats!
Our DIY Gut Load Mix Recipe
In any case, you should gut load your feeders every time you feed if you can. It does wonders for your pet’s health and will keep them healthy and happy longer.
Remember, you don’t need to gut load until you’re just about to give your feeders to your pet. Gut load is their last meal, and the best thing your pet will ever eat.
There are three basic options for gut loading.
One is to buy our ready-to-eat dry gut load mix, which is made of pure sunshine and rainbows. Just kidding. It’s actually made of whole wheat flour, brewer’s yeast, paprika (for beta carotene), soy powder (for a protein boost), and calcium carbonate with vitamin D3. This is the easiest, lowest-mess way to gut load.
Two is to make your own gut load mix at home. There are a lot of recipes out there, but they all involve a big mix of leafy greens (dandelion greens, collards, mustard greens, broccoli and kale for example), fruit (red apples, orange, mango), and other good stuff like carrots and sweet potato. This all gets mixed with a dry mix containing oats, sunflower seeds, cranberries, and even banana chips. Add some calcium supplement, and you’re good to go.
Grind the wet stuff in your blender, then add the dry stuff and turn it into a paste. You can save it in the fridge and use a little for your daily feeders.
And option three is to buy rabbit pellets or chicken feed, which contain almost the same mix of vital nutrients. If the ingredients on the label aren’t quite cutting it, you can always mix dry pellets with a good selection of leafy green veg and the fruits listed above to round it out.