New food ideas

[HelpfulHope]

I have a male purple tegus about a year old, and well in the grips of puberty, and while he's been more adventurous with new foods, I'm still concerned he isn't getting enough variety is diet. I know his diet should primarily carnivorous, with a good mix of whole prey and organs, but it's hard to get them to eat anything other than meat. It's very easy to get him to eat poultry, salmon, quail eggs and chicken gizzards. As well as fruit like blueberries and mangoes. Occasionally we treat him to live bugs, young mice, and thawed pinkies. However, other than his calcium supplement, those seem to be the only things he's willing to eat. He turns his nose up at basically any leafy vegetable even when they're well emulsified into his food. The only vegetable he seems to like are carrots, and that's really hit or miss.
We feed him as much as he can eat in a sitting, more or less every other day or when his seam is present (sometime he doesn't eat much, and other times he tends to sleep all day when it rains) , and we use tongs and a clicker when doing so.
Any advice on how to get this unruly teenager to eat his greens?

 

[Retnoo]

Same problem here. My juvenile will spit out any vegetable i give him, and the only fruit he seems to like is banana. Banana is good, but can't be given in large quantities since it contains such high potassium.
I've heard some owners cover their greens in egg yolk to make them taste appealing. Combining greens with meat can be an effective method. Sometimes I wrap my roaches with cilantro to get my tegu to eat it.

 

[Sean32817]

Get yourself one of those small, bullet style Ninja blenders - $20-30 model - and simply blend in the salad with the meat.

Rex is the same way, only eating his blueberries and bananas, so by grinding everything together into a tegu pate he really doesn't have any choice but to consume what he needs to consume along with what he wants to consume.

 

[Dude Bro Man 433]

Cover all the food you want him to eat with a raw egg.

 

[Al's_Pals]

Hello! I've heard lots of people with the same issue. I've always done my food the way I'm about to explain and have never had a problem with mine eating. Plus I feel less food is wasted and you spend less time on food prep. So I do a blended version that I saw in this Rose City Reptile video:

So I usually make two batches at a time (like one fish-based and one turkey-based) and put appropriate leafy greens in each batch then put a few different types of veggies in each one. Once it's well blended (I use a food processor) I fill a cupcake tray (no liners, just a TINY bit of veg oil so they're easy to get out after) and pop the tray in the freezer. After frozen they get thrown in a bag then defrosted for eating as needed. So now you have yummy frozen tegu food that's easy to dish out! And I give bites of fresh fruit & veg as treats and of course alternate insects and pinkies in as well.