[B]Are there any vegetables or fruits that I shouldn't feed my feeder crickets[/B]

[Lover of 8 legs]

I feed my crickets, oatmeal & a variety of fruit & vegetables like orange, lemon, apple & mango. But I was wondering, are there any fruits or vegetables that it is not advisable to feed to crickets & thus to my tarantulas.

 

[swade655]

I may get corrected, but i personally cant think of anything that is a no go make sure to peel the skins off of store bought fruit, as they may have trace amounts of pesticides. I personally feed all my crickets canned beans.... high in lots of protein and other goodies, check the labels if u want to give it a whirl. My crickets love the stuff.

 

[Gigas]

i agree with Swade, and i just was everything off any way, they eat everything, but remember the juicier something is , the more the cricks will smell personallly i use lettuce, the low nutrient content keeps em from growing and its full of water so they dont eat each other

 

[Ph4nToM]

I have been feeding my crickets carrots, they devour them pretty quick.

 

[metzgerzoo]

I don't feed crickets, nasty things, but I feed my roaches just about anything that I eat. The only things I do not give them are foods that have been seasoned. You don't want to give your feeders onion, garlic or pepper of any sort. The roaches are especially partial to over ripe bananas and peanut butter and jelly sandwhiches!
Defiently keep up the juicy fruits, they are an excellent source of moisture for your tarantulas. What I do is, a couple hours before I intend to feed, I'll put oranges, apples, mango, guava, tomatoes etc. in for my roaches and sometimes for my mealies and it "juices" them up real well so my inverts get a good, moisture rich meal, which is important. You want to "gut load" shortly before you intend to feed so the feeders don't poop out all of the good stuff before you have a chance to feed them to your spiders. I don't ever feed my feeders green leafy vegetables. The acid and iron content can be too much for them and those that eat them if the vegetables are given in large amounts.
I would steer clear of cabbage altogether.

 

[RVS]

Although I guess this has nothing to do with tarantulas, when I was raising mantid nymphs I was told to never feed the crickets carrots. I'm not exactly sure why, but apparently it makes the crickets toxic to mantids. Ever since I've never fed carrots to the crickets.
I'm not sure if this has been proven, but I highly doubt it does any harm to tarantulas.

 

[Amanda]

Do most of you generally prefer foods like those above over the gutload gel cubes?

 

[Tcrazy]

Do most of you generally prefer foods like those above over the gutload gel cubes?

Careful on the gel cubes that have high calciaum. FROM WHAT I HEARD its not very good for tarantulas, but very good for lots of reptiles. and amphibians.

 

[metzgerzoo]

Do most of you generally prefer foods like those above over the gutload gel cubes?

Me personaly, yes, I prefer "real" food to the processed stuff. It's less expensive, well, ok, it's not expensive at all because I buy the food for us and my roaches get some of the left overs. I do use cricket/roach food on occasion as well, but I use the granuales not the gel.

 

[syndicate]

just make sure to wash any producer very well before feeding.ive fed some crickets lettuce that wasnt washed before and it killed tons of them.i was sketch about feeding any of them to my t's after that and had a mass cricket burial in my toilet haha

 

[Ph4nToM]

Although I guess this has nothing to do with tarantulas, when I was raising mantid nymphs I was told to never feed the crickets carrots. I'm not exactly sure why, but apparently it makes the crickets toxic to mantids. Ever since I've never fed carrots to the crickets.
I'm not sure if this has been proven, but I highly doubt it does any harm to tarantulas.

Eeek.. well, my 2 T's have eaten about 5 crickets each (crickets that were fed carrots) and I havent noticed any problems with the T's. I just took out the half eaten carrots now and threw in a mango seed that still had some of the fruit on it.

 

[Vys]

You don't want to give your feeders onion, garlic or pepper of any sort.

How come?
Although I haven't tried onion, or garlic, I find pepper particularly practical. Someone said they tend to carry more pesticides than other fruit, but simply rinsing them appears to cancel their lethal-weapon status.

 

[metzgerzoo]

How come?
Although I haven't tried onion, or garlic, I find pepper particularly practical. Someone said they tend to carry more pesticides than other fruit, but simply rinsing them appears to cancel their lethal-weapon status.

Because they are natural insectocides. Given in large doses...well, they'll do what insectocides do.
People plant onions, garlic and certain types of peppers around their flower gardens and such to keep the bugs away for a reason.

 

[Vys]

Never heard the reason, never heard of the behaviour

Though now I make the connection between 'seasoned' and the kinds of fruits you said you'd avoid..so you mean the more 'spicy' peppers, not the 'normal' ones? (What are they called..bell fruit? Capsicum? Paprica?)