Phantom240
New Member
- Messages
- 292
- Location
- Slidell, LA
So I've had my leo for three weeks now, and she's starting to get frustrating with her feeding habits. The first four days, I didn't try to feed her, as I knew she'd take time to acclimate. The two days after, I put mealies in a shallow makeshift dish (cut the bottom out of a plastic cup, maybe 1/4" tall), and she would walk over the mealies and pay no attention. A few days later, I bought crickets, and she seemed to take to them okay. Not super tenacious with her hunting, but she got some. Two or three days later, same thing, though she only got a couple because she would strike and miss. Eventually, she gave up completely and sat in the corner. Next feeding a few days later was the same story. Then my shipment of dubia roaches came in, and a couple days later I used tongs to feed her, and she took 3-4 of them. They were medium sized, around 1/2" to 5/8" long. Since that feeding about a week ago, she's become quite uninterested in the roaches. She completely refuses to hunt them, and will eat one maybe two if I tong feed her. She won't hunt mealies (I had some giants because the pet store was out of regular large mealies), and a couple had gotten under the tiles and freshly pupated (white), and they were enormous. When I picked them up with the tongs, they wiggled like crazy and she happily ate them.
So to sum up:
Mealies - Won't hunt, but will eat with tongs, as they wiggle and entice her.
Crickets - She'll hunt, but gives up fast. I'm thinking that the 24x18 enclosure plus 5-10 crickets running around stresses her out. Will readily eat them from tongs.
Dubia - Won't hunt. Sometimes eats them when offered with tongs.
Wax Worms - Won't really hunt, but I only offer them once a week, and only a maximum of two.
Haven't yet had the opportunity to feed her Butterworms, Silkworms, or Hornworms yet.
So it seems I have a Prima Donna for a leo. Won't hunt much on her own, but readily accepts from tongs. Is this unusual? Is it okay? If I stop tong feeding her, will she eventually get hungry enough to want to hunt?
So to sum up:
Mealies - Won't hunt, but will eat with tongs, as they wiggle and entice her.
Crickets - She'll hunt, but gives up fast. I'm thinking that the 24x18 enclosure plus 5-10 crickets running around stresses her out. Will readily eat them from tongs.
Dubia - Won't hunt. Sometimes eats them when offered with tongs.
Wax Worms - Won't really hunt, but I only offer them once a week, and only a maximum of two.
Haven't yet had the opportunity to feed her Butterworms, Silkworms, or Hornworms yet.
So it seems I have a Prima Donna for a leo. Won't hunt much on her own, but readily accepts from tongs. Is this unusual? Is it okay? If I stop tong feeding her, will she eventually get hungry enough to want to hunt?