Are mealworms bad?

Hello, leopard gecko herders. Nice to be posting again . My sister has a family of bearded dragons and we often trade information. While I was talking to her today we talked about mealworms. Now, she heard that meal worms are bad because of their rigid exo-skeleton. She was told that the exo-skeleton is difficult to digest and can cause compaction, even DEATH.

It was the first time I heard of this, is this just another bunk rumor or is there some validity to her claim. I hope not because my gecks love their mealworms.

Thanks for the help. Once again, I love my gecks and I don't want to kill them.

I've been doing a lot of reading on this subject, as well as asking my vet and other informed individuals, and from everything I've heard, it seems that leos do incredibly well on a diet primarily of mealworms. Pretty much all insects are covered with the same hard exoskeleton to one degree or another, and in a harsh climate where these guys are from, the bugs are even more likely to have tough outer coverings. I wouldn't worry about it.

I've been using mealies since I got my first gecko when I was 10. I wouldnt read into it too much. Just stay away from giant mealworms. Superworms are different than giant mealworms. Giant mealworms are simply regular mealworms on hormones and "roids"

Yeah, I got sick of chasing crickets all over the house.


It made me feel like the insectivore!

<quote>Giant mealworms are simply regular mealworms on hormones and "roids"</quote>
Has anyone else heard of this?

Well you have to take into account the species. What may be bad for beardies may be fine for leos. There has been a lot documented cases of impaction from mealworms with young beardies but I have never heard of one with leos.

I have heard that giant mealworms are infact "unnatural" as you may call it. I'm not sure what exactly they use to get them to their size, but generally I stay away from them myself. Sorry I can't help you out on the topic further Steve!

Here's some info on "giant mealworms"

http://www.nyworms.com/giant_mealworms.htm


So it would appear that they are indeed altered with an insect growth hormone.

From my understanding, the hormone simply prevents the worm from maturing into the beetle stage, so they continue eating and growing. It may not be too horrible, but I still wouldn't feed it to my leos or dragons.

I know bearded dragons (especially small ones) don't do well with large amounts of chitin, and many small bearded babies have a tendency to take bigger bites than they can really handle. I think the bigger threat is a dragon too small choking on the mealworm. The diet of dragons should really be more diversified, and mealworms may be OK once in a while, but they should really be used in conjunction with crickets and fresh veggies/fruit (especially leafy greens).

So what does that mean exactly? Bearded dragons are set up for more of an omnivore, so they don't do well with lots of hard exoskeleton, whereas leos are purely carnivore so they are set up to handle the extra insects. Go ahead and go crazy with the mealworms on the leos (although it won't hurt to diversify once in a while), but avoid mealworms with small dragons and feed more crickets/roaches/veggies than mealworms to larger dragons.

EDIT: Also, if you're interested in bearded dragon diet (maybe for comparison to leos?), see this webpage. It was removed a while back but luckily the internet archive has kept a copy. It is by far the BEST bearded dragon diet information I've come accross. Note how many greens and veggies BDs are capabile of digesting while leos don't really ever eat such items. http://web.archive.org/web/20050307183201/http://home.comcast.net/~holachapulin/Nutrition.html

Ron Tremper's book says that mealworms are not a problem for Leos and it's what he feeds so I'd guess they must be relatively safe huh?