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#1815935
NCKeeper
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American Toad-diet/MBD 
Any of you run into Metabolic Bone Disease in your toads?
Recently we had a toad put to sleep because he was paralyzed in his rear legs. Xrays showed nothing broken however the bones looked liked they may have lacked calcium. A necropsy was done and nothing showed on the gorss, we are waiting for lab results.
ANYWAYS, besides dusting what do you think the best diet would be for an AMERICAN TOAD?
Have you ever tried de-shelled snails?
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08/01/08 01:18pm
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#1816105
Mrs. froggie
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Message To: NCKeeper In reference to Message Id: 1815935
American Toad-diet/MBD
I have never tried de-shelled snails. I don’t think they would be very healthy for them. I feed my american toad mealworms and crickets each feeding.
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08/01/08 03:32pm
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#1816525
JackAsp
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Message To: Mrs. froggie In reference to Message Id: 1816105
American Toad-diet/MBD
Most of the calcium is in the shells, isn’t it? One thing I’ve heard is that snails and slugs carry a lot more parasites than insects, so the only snails I’ve used were the canned ones. Which I dusted. If you want natural high-calcium invertenrate sources, your best bet is silkworms, Phoenix worms, that sort of thing. Even my big fat cane toad goes crazy for silkworms. Also hornworms, but perfect-sized little hornworms will get too big for an American in literally a couple of days, so I only suggest them if you’ve got something bigger that can eat them after that point. They go from egg to finger-sized green monster in 2 or 3 weeks, so just get the absolute smallest size you can find and give the toad nothing else until they’re too big. (I do it the other way around, actually, and feed my little male diamondback terrapin the smallest ones while feeding my toad the largest ones, but she’s not an American.) BY the way, do NOT use wild hornworms. Tomato hornworms versus tobacco hornworms doesn’t matter; they both eat poisonous leaves in the wild. But the captive-bred ones are great.
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08/01/08 09:38pm
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#1816533
JackAsp
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Message To: JackAsp In reference to Message Id: 1816525
American Toad-diet/MBD
Other possibilities are guppies, rosies, and even bait minnows. Fish, like snails, have a heavier parasite load than insects, so that has to be tested for periodically, but nutritionally they’re quite sound.
What was the toad that had to be put down eating?
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08/01/08 09:42pm
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