Pacman bone disease and calcium defeciency

[limnologist]

Generally true, I mean look at how pet stores keep them. While I've never done it myself, my understanding is that most people who feed fish to their frogs on a regular basis raise the fish themselves to ensure they're as healthy and nutritious as possible.

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Its quite easy to do if you have at least 2 square feet of space to put a pond in. goldfish breed like theres no tomorrow!

[DVirginiana]

I wouldn't recommend goldfish as feeders... They contain high levels of Thiaminase, which causes neurological problems in many reptiles (and even in mammals if consumed exclusively over long periods, as documented in some European studies on mink).

The problem is that how it affects a reptile really seems to depend on the individual. Some people can feed goldfish and rosy red minnows (ability to produce red pigment is a big giveaway that the fish species contains Thiaminase) to a reptile for years, and see only very minor issues. Other reptiles can eat goldfish for a couple weeks and develop fatal problems. There hasn't been a lot of in-depth research on the effects of Thiaminase in reptiles, but it's enough of a problem that many breeders avoid feeders with Thiaminase. It's probably not something that will cause your animal to drop dead overnight, but it's definitely something to be wary of doing often.

Silversides bought frozen from petstores are about the safest feeder fish out there.

[limnologist]

Thats true, it requires knowledge of your pet and also a sort of intimate knowledge to know how your pet would react to something like that (tryin not to sound weird here haha) . I just use goldfish as fillers when my other feeders are busy breeding. I also use Endler's guppies, green sunfish, and common native shiners (missouri).

[chibikaie]

I would definitely be very cautious about thiaminase. Also, I'd like to point out that it's very easy to offer an animal what looks like a wonderful, complete diet, yet still have them develop subclinical nutritional deficiencies. They may pick out favorite foods that don't have enough of one vitamin or mineral, and over time they will develop problems. And because they creep up slowly, these problems can be hard to notice, and hard to diagnose. And you cannot treat if you don't know what's wrong. Unless a keeper has devoted a LOT of time, effort, and scientifically-based research into invertebrate nutrition, I would strongly advise playing it safe and dusting at least some of the food items that are being offered. Look at it as a form of insurance toward the health and well-being of your pet. For myself, not only am I new to herps, I am not very good at raising invertebrates. I think I'm actually averaging 50% deaths in nearly a dozen different species. I've got to be realistic, I just can't seem to take good care of anything that doesn't have a backbone. There is simply no way I'm going to trust that I've raised them appropriately and can forego supplemental dusting. (Plus, at the rate I'm going, I am seriously not saving ANY money by attempting to set up feeder colonies. Someone else could probably do it on a shoestring budget and have them thrive. But that person is not me!)

[limnologist]

sorry to here you are not having much success with inverts. they can be difficult sometimes haha. anyway, it all really depends on how much you know about your animal individually.