How Much Food should a Beardy eat per day?

My male dragon, The Fearsome Pirate Le'Chuck, is a pig. In the morning he eats a small sized (about 4" diameter) plate of assorted greens. A few hours later he will eat as many mealworms/superworms/crickets/silkworms that I decide to put in his bowl or hand feed. Later on, in the early evening he will do the same. He eats anywhere from 50-80 bugs a day, and I've stopped counting now. Is this healthy? He was a rescue from a pet store and he's been in my care for a month now. I keep him under a 75 watt heat bulb and a screw in 70 watt UVB bulb. The temps are great and he's active, living on shelf liner with a sandbox. He will readily drink water from a bowl or while getting his daily bath and also eats dry and pre-killed (canned and/or roasted) prey. His temperment is great, he's calm and loves to sun himself.

I'll have pics of him and everything when I buy my Nikon Coolpix 3200 later on this week.

If this a baby bearded. This is normal eating.
If you have any more Questions. Go to this group
and ask.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pogona/

Info I have learned:
NO mealworms (high in chitin, causes impactions)
UVB bulbs are not all created equal.

Hope this helps.
Radena

I forgot to add, he's 3 year old and almost 22" STL. Gummy is almost 10 months and a solid 19" STL.

I'm sorry, but everyone has a "no this" and "no that", but others have no problems when feeding them. Le'Chuck practically squishes mealies and supers when he crunches on them and Gums usually cuts them in half leaving one section to wither so I need to hand feed it. Neither have shown any problems when dealing with ANY bugs or veggies.

Both dragons will get a mercury vapor 100 watt flood in the winter or whenever it gets cooler out, it gets a wee bit toasty in the cages with our outside temp still being in the mid to high 80's.

There's also a link to a certain webby filled with "shady" knowledge in the description, that tends to turn me off. Thanks anyway.

Both your dragons are old enough to eat and digest worms with no problem. The mealies are higher in chitin than the supers per weight volumn, this is a big concern for young dragons, but subadults and adults usually do not have a problem.

Sound like they both are doing well and have good appetites.... you must be doing it right

My only question is what is the 70 watt screw in uvb bulb..... if those are ESU, they will do for now, but I would upgrade like you said as soon as possible as they have a pretty low UVB output.

Gosh I envy you... I have never been able to get ANY of our dragons drinking from a bowl!!!!! They poo in them, sit in them and knock them over.... but never drink from them!

This is one of mine using her bowl of water

Thanks! As soon as it gets a little bit cooler out the guy with the screw-in bulb (yep, an ESU) will be getting an Active UV Heat bulb. Watching him drink is rather amusing, he puffs his nostrils up so it appears they have been sealed and then he dunks his head into the water dish, he drinks for ten seconds or so a few times a day. The other one doesn't reconize the water dish either, she tends to stomp right through it without realizing she's wet and then goes about everything else. She will drink when I spray her or the cage walls, or she'll freak out and beard up and hiss - she's got a water aversion and hates to be bathed these days, Le'Chuck loves his baths.

Over the last week, Le'Chuck has been pigging out and drinking, but has not been pooping! I took him to the vet this morning and he got an enema, and it worked well. Now I need to bring the sample in to see if his parasites are gone. Before inserting the little rubber tube, this inch long white thing came out of his cloaca. Fortunately it's only a mucous plug and not a parasite like we thought. Todays poops wasn't stinky at all, but it was excessively wet, so the saline could be disguising the smell some, I guess I'll find out later today though.