Eating calcium like its candy?

[SpottedDragon]

Nel started doing something odd this afternoon. She was out and about and very active which she usually doesn't do in the middle of the day. She kept going over to her food dish and climbing inside it - I thought she was extra hungry and gave her her roaches early - (last night she had 3 with reptivite and 3 without)- she completely ignored the bugs and was chomping at the bottom of the dish where some calcium/vitamin powder has fallen off the bugs this week.

To test what she was doing I moved her out of the bowl and sprinkled plain calcium (about 1/16 of a teaspoon) in the bowl. She immediately climbed over my arm and into the bowl to get to the powder and started munching away. I let her have a few licks then removed it when she showed no signs of stopping. Wyrm never did this, could she not be getting enough calcium from her food? or is this a sign of something else going on?

Age ~5 months old, Weight 45g, not 100% sure on gender yet

Supplement Schedule:
Monday - plain zoomed reptical (blue bottle)
Tuesday - no supplements
Wednesday - plain zoomed reptical (blue bottle)
Thursday - no supplements
Friday- no supplements
Saturday - zoomed reptiVite withOUT D3 (orange bottle)
Sunday- no supplements

*I only dust 1/2 of her insects in a feeding. If she gets 6 bugs, 3 are dusted. I started doing this since when I first got Wyrm I was over dosing vitamins and his vet recommended not dusting every single feeder.*

She gets zoomed Reptical WITH D3 (green label) on the 1st and the 15th of the month - due to UVB usage. Also gets organic bee pollen once a month for extra nutrients

 

[acpart]

There used to be an idea that geckos self regulated how much calcium they took, so we should leave it in the enclosure and they would take what they needed. Lately there has been more concern about geckos getting too much calcium and keepers are in doubt that they really know how much they need. In my opinion, a reasonable compromise would be to let her have calcium now if she wants it but not to offer it continually.

Aliza

 

[SpottedDragon]

Thanks Aliza. She just shed about three days ago as well, so maybe a major growth spurt is in the works. I'll put a little in tonight and see what she does with it - but if she eats it all I'm unsure if I should dust tomorrow too.

I know that animals can self-regulate their needs, but I've also see sooo many weird items that animals fixate on eating, whether or not its good for them (like gravel, cloth, coins, acorns, entire bags of food) so I'm a little distrustful of her stopping when she should lol.

 

[SpottedDragon]

Thanks Aliza. She just shed about three days ago as well, so maybe a major growth spurt is in the works. I'll put a little in tonight and see what she does with it - but if she eats it all I'm unsure if I should dust tomorrow too.

I know that animals can self-regulate their needs, but I've also see sooo many weird items that animals fixate on eating, whether or not its good for them (like gravel, cloth, coins, acorns, entire bags of food) so I'm a little distrustful of her stopping when she should lol.