Wild Caught Questions

[Samalander]

FWIW I have fed my pacman wild caught worms, insects, and small animals my cats killed (birds, mice and even baby rats). I have had this frog for over 22 years now

[poison]

FWIW I have fed my pacman wild caught worms, insects, and small animals my cats killed (birds, mice and even baby rats). I have had this frog for over 22 years now

Please tell me what the benefits of doing that is. And how many specimens have you worked with?

[DVirginiana]

FWIW I have fed my pacman wild caught worms, insects, and small animals my cats killed (birds, mice and even baby rats). I have had this frog for over 22 years now

I have a garter snake that has exceeded the captive life expectancy of his species by 50% (average is 8, he's 12) that I unknowingly fed feeders that have been PROVEN as toxic for the first ten years I had him. He's doing great, so clearly a LOT of what I was doing was correct, but I'm not going to recommend what are unquestionably risky feeders to a kid who's just getting into reptiles because it worked for me.
And they are, unquestionably, risky. It's never something I would recommend to a young kid without the resources to really find out what the local pesticide use patterns are.

[COOCOpUcHoo]

I wasn't talking about toxins that he would be immune to, I was talking about disease.

[Hypnotic]

I'm going to hop on the bandwagon and say don't do it, it's like playing russian roulette with your frogs life. There is a good reason we keep the animals that some of us eat in farms. Would you eat a cow that has been grazing behind a highway, inhaling toxic fumes and eating the trash besides the road? Remember, animals travel, be it by jumping, running or flying, you have no idea where they have been.
The only reason to feed stuff from the wild is because you either can't afford food or are a cheapskate. I think that neither of the forementioned people, should own pets.
The entire reason of keeping pets, is providing the best care for your animal and watching them thrive in the unnatural enviroment we create. So don't mess with the basics. That's my two cents

[demon amphibians]

[QUOTE=Hypnotic;189780]I'm going to hop on the bandwagon and say don't do it, it's like playing russian roulette with your frogs life. There is a good reason we keep the animals that some of us eat in farms. Would you eat a cow that has been grazing behind a highway, inhaling toxic fumes and eating the trash besides the road? Remember, animals travel, be it by jumping, running or flying, you have no idea where they have been.

I could not disagree more with this statement.

Wild animals are 10 times safer to eat then farm raised animals. In fact the farming of animals produce several times the amount of polution as all motor vehichles in the world. I can show you info that will turn anyone who see it into vegitarians. look up on youtube how hotdogs are made, just for starts. cattle that are allowed to rome free ranges are much safer and healthier to eat. wild birds are also much safer then farm raised chickens. Cows, chickens, and pigs are all feed there own droppings, a simple chemical everyone knows about that is found in animal dung is ammonia that is just one of several. just that alone makes the quailty of the meat worse then a wild animal. cows are very smart and picky eaters they wouldnt just walk up and eat a piece of trash on the road. however it would eat anything if it was given unfavorable living environment such as on your average farm. Also breathing car exhust is much cleaner then the air the average cow is breathing on a farm. I know this is off topic and i apologise if i am coming across rude. But i really want to inform you of the truth because this is the leading cause of polution in the world and one of the reasons many species of frogs are extinct.

true, you dont know where the insects have been but that doesnt mean they are anymore dangerous then a captive breed insect. you just have to be selective of where you catch them from. be smart.

[COOCOpUcHoo]

Thank you everyone

[DVirginiana]

@Maverick: lol, don't worry. Store-bought crickets still have plenty of diseases. Anything living in such close quarters will have disease and parasites. I'd recommend that you get more experience with caring for frogs before you try w/c feeders (I actually don't recommend w/c at all, but definitely not at this point for you). That way you have a better idea of what can be harmful, and you'd be able to spot and fix problems more quickly.

-------

Well, I'm vegan, so I'm probably full of pesticides from all the store-bought vegetables I consume... lol
Really though, most pesticides are surface-sprayed and are not absorbed into the plant. You can get rid of the overwhelming majority by thorough washing. Which is what you should do before giving any to your feeders.

LOL Anyone who thinks mass feeder suppliers feed their crickets veggies is living in a fantasy world! They feed them a dry, processed, nutrient substance that looks a lot like cardboard, is cheap, and can store for years. So, no, they probably aren't exposed to more pesticides than anything you find outside.

Okay... Who has neighbors that spray herbicides on their driveway? Who has neighbors that may wash their dog outside, washing the soap and flea powder into the grass? You think a grasshopper can't eat something in your neighbors yard then fly 20 feet into your yard? We're not just talking about heavy-duty agricultural pesticides. For goodness sake, we tell people to wash their hands before handling their frogs so that nothing we've gotten on our hands on a daily basis can harm them.
It's just... not accurate... to pretend like there is no chance the bugs in their yard have come into contact with something that can harm their frog. Yes, if you're in a particularly rural area, or especially careful about what you harvest you might get lucky for a very long time. Maybe whatever is on the bugs isn't enough of a concentration to harm your frog. But the bottom line is that the risk of chemical contamination is always there, and it is not there for most store-bought feeders. It's your choice to take that risk, but pretending that it isn't there is just misleading to others.

[GrifTheGreat]

This has been covered so many times that it kind of gets repetative. The same reasons are giver for why not to do this as in every other thread over this subject.

One main parasite that locusts and grasshopper will carry are Tapeworms. You have no way of knowing they have them unless you cut them open. Just a warning. The likelyhood of getting one with a Tapeworm isn't very high, but is still a serious risk.

Everyone has pretty much covered this.

[Namio]

Pesticides can be an issue but unless you live in a farming community where large amounts of pestesides are used the chances of you encountering this are very low. Like i said before it is ok to be overly cautious and there are dangers everywhere but you will encounter just has many hazard feeding store bought food items. Think about people who culture there own feeders? Crickets, roaches, you name it all, eat veggies. Think about it. What do you feed your cultured insects? Store bought veggies right? even organic veggies can have pesticides on them. And i will promise you this the large scale cricket breeders where pet stores get there crickets from do not feed organic veggies to there crickets before they sell them. What i am saying is that your attempts to prevent feeding pesticide riden insects to your frogs may result in you feeding more of it to them through your captive breed insects. You can rinse your store bought veggies with water all day long and it still wont remove all the pesticides. Thats why you have to use a special rinse to soak your veggies in and that stuff is 60 bucks for 20oz. It is really the only way to have 100% pesticide free food for your feeders which your frogs will be eating.

Wild animals are 10 times safer to eat then farm raised animals. In fact the farming of animals produce several times the amount of polution as all motor vehichles in the world. I can show you info that will turn anyone who see it into vegitarians. look up on youtube how hotdogs are made, just for starts. cattle that are allowed to rome free ranges are much safer and healthier to eat. wild birds are also much safer then farm raised chickens. Cows, chickens, and pigs are all feed there own droppings, a simple chemical everyone knows about that is found in animal dung is ammonia that is just one of several. just that alone makes the quailty of the meat worse then a wild animal. cows are very smart and picky eaters they wouldnt just walk up and eat a piece of trash on the road. however it would eat anything if it was given unfavorable living environment such as on your average farm. Also breathing car exhust is much cleaner then the air the average cow is breathing on a farm. I know this is off topic and i apologise if i am coming across rude. But i really want to inform you of the truth because this is the leading cause of polution in the world and one of the reasons many species of frogs are extinct.

true, you dont know where the insects have been but that doesnt mean they are anymore dangerous then a captive breed insect. you just have to be selective of where you catch them from. be smart.

You are right on many of the things you've said, but the practices of farmed mammals for human consumption is quite irrelevant and different from commercially available amphibian diets. Saying wild animals (specifically you meant birds and mammals) are much safer for [human]consumption than farm cow, chicken, etc. does not necessarily draw a parallel line next to farm raised crickets, roaches, nightcrawlers, etc.

You did bring up an excellent point in chemically contaminated vegetables. One simply way to solve this problem is to peel off the surface/skin of vegies such as carrots, apples, potatoes, etc. before you serve it to your crickets, etc. By doing so you can pretty much get rid of most if not all pesticide that was on the vegetable/fruit.

[DVirginiana]

I just realized that I replied to someone who isn't even on this thread earlier... What I get for having multiple windows open on the same forum I suppose...

[nirotorin]

Yep peeling, that's the ultimate solution. I don't always do it though. Sometimes it just seems too uptight. Same reason I feed my animals the occasional wild caught insect. I mean wild insects seem to be pretty ok for wild herps. Idunno I really think it's one of those things that isn't as big a deal as we make it sometimes.

That grasshopper tapeworm thing kind of freaks me out though.

[demon amphibians]

I wasn't talking about toxins that he would be immune to, I was talking about disease.

(When it comes to disease a frogs immune system is very different from ours. We can build an immunity against many different diseases by contracting it. But in many cases frogs are unable to do that. It may take several generations of a spieces to gain immunities to a diseases introduced to the area. Cytrid is a very dangerous disease that is devastating the frog world. It is spread in water.. You can encounter just as many dieases and parasites from store bought food too. I have heard of several cases of this.)
Pesticides can be an issue but unless you live in a farming community where large amounts of pestesides are used the chances of you encountering this are very low. Like i said before it is ok to be overly cautious and there are dangers everywhere but you will encounter just has many hazard feeding store bought food items. Think about people who culture there own feeders? Crickets, roaches, you name it all, eat veggies. Think about it. What do you feed your cultured insects? Store bought veggies right? even organic veggies can have pesticides on them. And i will promise you this the large scale cricket breeders where pet stores get there crickets from do not feed organic veggies to there crickets before they sell them. What i am saying is that your attempts to prevent feeding pesticide riden insects to your frogs may result in you feeding more of it to them through your captive breed insects. You can rinse your store bought veggies with water all day long and it still wont remove all the pesticides. Thats why you have to use a special rinse to soak your veggies in and that stuff is 60 bucks for 20oz. It is really the only way to have 100% pesticide free food for your feeders which your frogs will be eating.