Not gaining weight

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majahawt

New member
This weeks weigh-day was excellent!

Eclair is now at 31 grams, meaning that she's gained about 7 grams in the last month. I'm proud of her for tipping the 30-mark!

Donut gained about 5 grams this month, putting him at 75 grams. I can't believe he's that heavy and long (about 25 cm) already, he's only about 9 months. He's just a big guy I guess!
 
M

majahawt

New member
Eclair finally did a whammy! She gained 4 grams this week even though I've been worried about her eating (she must be eating more than I thought). Now 35 grams, yay!

And fat sausage Donut is up to 78 grams :3
 
M

majahawt

New member
I'm not entirely sure if she actually had a period of less eating or if I just didn't notice but I counted her mealworms when I put them in the other day and she had eaten 11-14!

On that note, how do you guys feed the roaches to your leos? I'm having trouble with them disappearing into hollows or hides or behind walls or you name it and neither of my geckos want to eat outside of their tanks :/ They won't eat if I take stuff out of their tank or rearrange either, so it's rather difficult at the moment.
 
Elizabeth Freer

Elizabeth Freer

Well-known member
I either place dubia in a clear glass feeding dish that has a slanted rock ramp right up to the lip of the dish or handfeed the dubia to Cha.
 
hmarie186

hmarie186

New member
I hold the roach down by the leg with tweezers (with the point down) and let them grab it. They never seem to want to eat them from a bowl..
 
M

majahawt

New member
Since she gained several grams last week, Eclair decided to only gain one gram this week :/ I'm going to start trying really hard to get her to eat superworms because all she wants to eat right now are mealworms and the occasional roach.

Of course, Donut is now 81 grams. He's like the opposite of Eclair - he just won't stop growing!
 
M

majahawt

New member
I was telling my boyfriend the other day that Eclair had probably been really lazy all week because she was in the middle of a growth spurt (she's been looking a lot bigger lately) and she's gained 5 grams since last week so I guess I was right! She's an entire 41 grams now~ I'm very proud of her.

It's always a bit difficult to tell with her but I believe she's getting ready for a shed too :>

[EDIT] Donut keeps up his usual pace and is at 84 grams now :3
 
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M

majahawt

New member
We've always just used cheap green short plastic tongs so I got some long metal ones and now they'll finally eat from tongs! It's gonna make feeding them dubias so much easier! :D
 
M

majahawt

New member
I believe part of Eclair's problem is poor eyesight. AFAIK Blizzards tend to have some problems with this. She does eat from her dish and she has been gaining some weight lately but she doesn't acknowledge roaches or anything I drop into the tank for her. It's not like she's doing the walking over to the food and licking it and then refusing it but she simply doesn't notice the food at all, no matter how much it's moving.

Any tips on this? Would increasing the light in her tank help her? The only light we have ATM is a regular ceiling lamp.
 
JIMI

JIMI

New member
Try setting the roach on its back on top of a white paper towel and poke it so that it wiggles around. I did this with Theseus when it seemed like he was not noticing the phoenix worms that I was offering him and it worked. The contrasting white background helps make it more noticeable and keeping it on its back prevents it from escaping. If they manage to get back on their feet then find something smoother. A light colored tile works well for me. The way they wiggle around as they are trying to get back on their legs really catches Theseus's attention. Hope it works!:)
 
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M

majahawt

New member
JIMI said:
Try setting the roach on its back on top of a white paper towel and poke it so that it wiggles around. I did this with Theseus when it seemed like he was not noticing the phoenix worms that I was offering him and it worked. The contrasting white background helps make it more noticeable and keeping it on its back prevents it from escaping. If they manage to get back on their feet then find something smoother. A light colored tile works well for me. The way they wiggle around as they are trying to get back on their legs really catches Theseus's attention. Hope it works!:)
Click to expand...

That's a quick and easy solution! I'll definitely try it!
 
hmarie186

hmarie186

New member
When mine aren't interested in food they act blind to it. I know they can see it, they just act like it doesn't exist. Perhaps she's just not a real big eater and food doesn't interest her a whole lot? A brighter light could make it worse though. They can see in low light pretty well, but brighter lights may irritate them.
 
M

majahawt

New member
Eclair is still doing her silly mealworms-only thing. It's fine though, she eats a good amount of them! At some point I'm sure she'll open up to eating other things again. I could do the whole not giving her food for a few days-thing and she might have some roaches but I prefer not to since she's still growing. She's always got a dish of mealworms in because she likes having food throughout the day.

Last week she hadn't gained any weight but she hadn't lost any weigh either, even though she refused to eat anything because she was all grumpy from ovulating. Hopefully on sunday she'll have gained some weight again! I'd like her to go back up to the 40's :)

Donut LOVES his bluebottles! I didn't realise until today how much he liked them when I put a whole bunch in on a tub-lid and he just INHALED THEM in like 1 minute! And there were probably about 30 of them in there! Since most of his food items are large, we haven't been using a dish with him for a while and he's gotten sort of iffy about it but the lid definitely worked.
 
M

majahawt

New member
She's such a little hassle, though. I think she's turning into more of an "observe"-pet rather than handling-pet. I don't know if she's still super grumpy because she's ovulating or if that's just how her personality has developed. She keeps wanting to come out to run around but she totally freaks out in our hands (runs off, wiggles, screeches). She's calm if she's sitting on our shoulders/backs. It's fine, I'm starting to come to peace with it but it makes it very difficult whenever we have to get her out for cleaning or weighing
 
hmarie186

hmarie186

New member
Especially when she screams at you for cleaning her cage. :/ I thought females were a little more "rambunctious" than males and more jumpy in general?
 
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