Calcuim thoughts?

[SpottedDragon]

I have been musing on calcium dosing and ca : p ratios recently. Here's some of what I've come up with as well as some questions...its a word wall ;/ sorry

Zoo Med Repticalcium NO D3 = between 380,000 and 430,000 mg (38-43%) of pure precipitated calcium carbonate

Directions ("servings"): 12 dusted crickets (i assume roaches work too) per 71 grams of body weight per week

My gecko is 94 grams. This would mean he needs 1.3 "servings" a week or 15.6 dusted feeders with plain calcium.

Zoo Med Repticalcium WITH D3 = between between 380,000 and 430,000 mg (38-43%) of pure precipitated calcium carbonate + a minimum of 22,907 IU of D3

Directions ("servings"): 12 dusted crickets (i assume roaches work too) per 71 grams of body weight per week

My gecko is 94 grams. This would mean he needs 1.3 "servings" a week or 15.6 dusted feeders with calcium and D3 supplement - however mine gets UVB and so only gets D3 once a month.

Zoo Med Reptivite NO D3 = lots of vitamins + between 25.9 and 29% calcium and 10.57% phosphorus [over a 2:1 ca : p ratio)

Directions ("servings"): 12 dusted crickets (i assume roaches work too) per 71 grams of body weight per week

My gecko is 94 grams. This would mean he needs 1.3 "servings" a week or 15.6 dusted feeders with reptivite, which has a fair amount of calcium in it.

So, for my sub-adult gecko (13 months old) who is on 4 feedings a week, he would have to consume 46.8 insects a week...or 11.7 feeders per feeding. In reality he eats between 4 and 8 dubia, 4-6 hornworms, 5-10 mealworms, or 10-20 phoenix worms per feeding he rarely eats 11 insects in one sitting unless they are the phoenix worms - depending on what insect I am feeding. I don't dust the phoenix worms since their ratio is 2.1:1 ca : p. When I was dusting all his feeders in each supplemented meals he was getting over-supplemented and was acting ill until I took him to a vet that specialized in reptiles. Now I only dust a few of his feeders each meal. His supplementation schedule is:

Monday- no supplements
Wednesday- Plain Calcium
Friday- Reptivite
Saturday- no supplements
and D3 on the first of every month.

My question is this: since each of the zoo med supplements have the same dosing instructions should they all be considered 1 supplement? i.e. geckos need 12 supplemented insects per 71g of body weight per week total- this is my understanding at least.

Since all three supplements include similar calcium concentrations and only the vitamins include phosphorus then rotating the supplement types throughout the week is the same as what the directions indicate. Considering all supplements as a "general single supplement" means that of the 15-30 insects he eats a week, only 12 of them total need meds on them no matter which version of the powder it is, which is what the exotic vet also recommended.


Now, on to my second musing...How do you know that adding calcium to insects is getting the proper 2:1 ratio? What is the math behind it?

Per the feeder insect nutrition chart dubia roaches are 1:3.25 ca : p ratio. The amounts of both are in mg/kg of insect. So how do know that a light dusting of calcium on the bugs change that 1 unit calcium to 6.5 units of calcium? (total ratio of 6.5:3.25 or 2:1)

Just trying to figure out how / why dusting works when it seems so incredibly unlikely that random unmeasured dusting of supplements actually manage to somehow work. I'm used to calculating medicines and nutrition down to the 10th of an ml...giving an amount of an antibiotic that just "looks right" would either result in under or over dose, but would likely not just successfully treat the infection without also causing other side effects.

This hurts my brain and maybe I should just accept that it works and not question it...

 

[acpart]

I need a certain number of calories to maintain my body weight. This can vary by my level of activity. I need a certain amount of vitamin D3 and calcium to maintain my bone mass. The amount I get can vary with the season (sun exposure), whether or not I take supplements and how much milk I drink. My point is that the recommended dose is likely an unachievable target. Based on your musings, I would imagine that if the recommended dose is the center of a locus of possible doses, that it may be hard to achieve that as an average. I don't even know how the product makers came up with that number. In addition, once a feeder is dusted, it begins immediately to groom off the dusting, so who knows how much the gecko is getting unless you hand feed the gecko each feeder as soon as you dust it. All I can say is that my geckos range from 3-16 years old, get one feeding of dusted feeders per week (and of course the day geckos get full spectrum lighting and the CGD eating geckos get supplement contained in their CGD) and no one has MBD.

Aliza

 

[SpottedDragon]

I totally agree, I just couldn't find any kind of study or research anywhere as to amounts of calcium or how it actually remedies the imbalance that insects naturally have. Obviously it works or every gecko would get MBD. As for the products themselves, it seems like such an arbitrary dose, esp considering how many species never get to 71 grams, then math comes in and I don't know how many regular pet owners would go that far lol.

These are just the kinds of things I think about with all my animals. The hows and whys of stuff is interesting

Also I hand feed my boy and he gets the dusted ones first before all the powder comes off. He won't eat from a bowl reliably anymore, so nothing supplemented goes into his dish because it is highly likely that he won't eat it.