ground turkey

[MMRR - jif]

I have personally seen a friends Tegus become unhealthy because they were fed a primarily ground turkey diet that included no supplementation. I will feed ground turkey mixed with egg, fruits and vegetables a couple of times per month but no more often than that. I do feed turkey giblets and necks on occasion, also beef heart, venison, chicks and quail. They also get iguana eggs when in season.

Once in a blue moon I will purchase a couple of cans of Wysong canned dog food to feed as a treat. This food comes in several varieties including beef, chicken, turkey, duck, lamb, venison, and rabbit. The ingredients listed on the can, for example for the rabbit, reads "whole rabbit, water". All of the tegus and the monitors love it but it is a treat only.

 

[VARNYARD]

Bobby, I know you know what you're doing. You have obviously thought this out. I guess my problem is that I've seen a number of obese tegus that have been fed only raw turkey, and no insects veggies, fruit ect. If you have a tegu on the schedule you're suggesting, they'd be fine. The problem is that people just don't understand how a tegus diet should be balanced. I think a lot of people want to see they're tegu eat meat 24/7. Some kind of macho thing I guess (another reason why I liked your video post about not feeding live foods) I'm with you 150% on the canned food stuff. Most of the ingredients are just filler.

Well I do not think that most of the ones you are talking about are obese at all. I think you are trying to compare monitors to tegus, and there is no way this can be done. Monitors are not tegus, they are much more streamline. It is like comparing greyhounds to bull dogs, bulldogs do not have the same build as a greyhound, and if you did starve them down to that size they would be very unhealthy. Tegus are the same way; they are not streamline and are not monitors. Tegus are wide broad massive animals, with a thick build. Or you could compare corn snakes with blood pythons, the bloods are not built like the corns.

 

[shiftylarry]

Tegus are wide broad massive animals, with a thick build. Or you could compare corn snakes with blood pythons, the bloods are not built like the corns.

I know there is a difference, but tegus can get obese too. It's just not as easy to recognize unless it's pretty bad.

I think you can agree that an animal fed nothing but meat would have problems with weight, skin, and overall health.

 

[Lexi]

Yeah Reds need fruit to keep their skin healthy...

 

[rebeccaej]

A few of the turkey companies are coming out with 99% fat free turkey. With only 1% fat, I think it is probably the lowest in fat you can get in a carnivorous diet. I bought some last week and have been using it, both in my own food and for my tegu, and it seems to work great.

While I know many people disagree, I also feed wet cat food once or twice a week. I like the Meow Mix brand, as it only has about 2% fat in it. I've been using it for months and my tegu loves the stuff.

I actually was in San Diego this past weekend and got into a long conversation with a reptile keeper and breeder that works at the reptile house at the Zoo. He said that while the "SDZ Diet" was used a bit in the seventies, it was never made up of only turkey and calcium, but of a lot of supplementary foods as well. The turkey was also not the ground turkey that you buy at the store, but whole turkeys thrown in to a meat grinder, bone and organs included, which is a complete diet. He also said that they don't use that any more, they have developed a new food, made from a blend of poultry, pork, fish, and other nutrients. The food is dried and looks like dog kibble, but is served to all the zoo's monitors (except the Komodo dragons, that would be too expensive for such a large lizard) after being soaked in water for a half hour. He gave me a bag and I've been feeding it to my tegu and I have no complaints. Once it is soaked in warm water it is soft enough for her to swallow and it seems to really get her feeding response going!

 

[shiftylarry]

Well, you're right about the SDZ diet. As you can see, it is much more complex than just ground turkey, vitams, and bone meal.

In terms of the cat food thing, you couldn't have picked a worse food to feed. Especially "meow mix" it is full of cheap fillers and horrible for your tegu. Heck, I wouldn't even feed that to my cat it's so bad.

 

[Lexi]

I can see why some people think it is ok to feed cat food.. In Burts care sheet for his B&W's he says if is fine...and he is a big breeder..so people believe him... I always thought that dog/cat food can lead to liver problems and death.

 

[angelrose]

:chin I follow you guys so far but now I have to know how can you tell if your tegu is obese :?: any pics :?: and ...


I am confused when it comes to colombians :?: they do not hibernate and they eat meat or let me just say Angel will eat all kinds of meat (but no mice anymore) and if I try to sneak some in there (chop it all together) she will take a bite and walk away :roll:

 

[Lexi]

See to me these pics of Red tegus seem to be on the heffty side to me.. They skin looks way to tight on them... But to tell you the truth , i dont kno what a "fat" tegu looks like.. Because everyone on here seems to take amazing care of them. But Angelrose your col. Tegu looks fine (if thats a recent pic of him/her you posted)

The pic above isnt a "fat" or Obese tegu.. but it looks to me to be on the hefty side.

 

[shiftylarry]

Maybe some high end brands of dog/cat food such as "solid gold", which are holistic and free of harmful additives might be o.k., but any regular old dog food you'd find in the supermarket wont cut it. They contain items like "chicken byproduct" that have been deemed unsuitable for human consumption by the FDA.

 

[angelrose]

Lexi wow, that skin is tight and I have not seen a tegu looking like that I would agree with being hefty. thank you.
all the pics of everybody were just taken during last weekend.

I am getting a good picture now of what an obese reptile looks like (I am working on my sav). :roll:

 

[Lexi]

Yeah like i said i dont know if they are obese or not..But they look big to me..
And your Sav is a big boy!!!! He must be in heaven.

 

[Mvskokee]

in my experience ground turkey is kinda messy and it makes the poop loose and very stinky i dont recomend it

 

[rebeccaej]

Well, you're right about the SDZ diet. As you can see, it is much more complex than just ground turkey, vitams, and bone meal.

In terms of the cat food thing, you couldn't have picked a worse food to feed. Especially "meow mix" it is full of cheap fillers and horrible for your tegu. Heck, I wouldn't even feed that to my cat it's so bad.

I did a ton of research on different brands of cat food and tried a bunch of them out. Meow mix is just chunks of fish and poultry in little bite sizes. There is also practically no fat (1.8% in most varieties). I feed it about once a week, maybe twice depending on the week, and I haven't seen any problems with it. I know a few people that also keep them that use it as a supplement. I also drain it, first, so she eats the meat and not the watery preservatives in the amount it is packaged in (though of course she still gets some, but preservatives don't cause problems in any animal... really).

As far as being suitable for human consumption... no pet food is. That is why it all says "not for human consumption" on the label, because it is intended for animals. Chicken byproduct is chicken parts that people don't usually eat... such as organs. It happens, though, that while we don't think they taste the best, they are the healthiest part! They aren't labeled for people, though, because they aren't handled in a way that would make them sanitary enough to be served to people. They are still clean, though, and no problems arise from feeding it to any animal.

 

[tupinambis]

Whole prey items are certainly more nutritional than meats. When talking about one whole vertebrate prey to the next, nutrition varies little, but other things do. Fur can be a major problem for tegus if their husbandry isn't ideal, and has even been ascribed to causing impaction in some cases.
Meats are similar, in that one meat source (chicken, pork, beef, turkey, etc.) show very little difference from one to the other unless you're talking about regular grind to extra lean. However, the one thing that turkey MAY have going against it is they tend to have a high degree of medications used on them to keep them healthy. So much so that lately I've been spotting a number of specialist butcher's shops advertising medication-free turkey. Something to think about.
Lastly, the myth on fertilized eggs should really be put to rest. There's a lot of people spouting that fertilized eggs are healthier than unfertilized. Not true. The reason there is concern over eggs is the compound avidin, which is present in the egg white. It binds to the compound biotin, which is present in the yolk and is essential for physiological processes. If it is bound to avidin, the biotin-avidin complex is not readily absorbable. Fertilizing the egg has been thought to get rid of the avidin. This is rather false. Fertilizing the egg makes the fetus form, and as the fetus develops, this slowly uses up the avidin. So unless people are feeding fertilized eggs that have pretty much developed into chicks inside the egg, a fresh fertilized egg will be just as nutritious as an unfertilized egg. However, heat will denature the avidin. Soft boil your eggs and you will have a biotin-rich, avidin-free nutritious meal.

 

[Aranha]

Hmm ive put my tegus on a new diet of green salad mixed with salmon and cod (gently cooked). Good or bad diet?

 

[angelrose]

tupanambis, thank you again for breaking it all down and taking the time.

 

[CaseyUndead]

If Bobby uses ground turkey with his beautiful tegus, then it sounds fine to me!

 

[i0r]

We don't have ground turkey here in Argentina either.....and everyones saying they use ground turkey as staple food, and tbh i would love to as well. But i cant. We do however have turkey burgers.....but i'm not sure if it would be safe to feed her that because of it's ingredients.
Ther ingredients are: Turkey meat, water, hydrogenous vegetal fat, texturized soya protein, salt, milk powder, onion powder, white apple vinegar, rosemary extract, sodium lactate (INS 325), sodium polyphosphate (INS 452i), oregano aroma, natural white and black pepper aromas.

Would it be ok to feed her that??

 

[shiftylarry]

I'd be worried about the pepper, the sodium, the vinergar, and the onion powder if that answers your question.