Vermiculite in stool

I use vermiculite for my hide/shed box substrate. Lately I have been noticing that a large majority of my Leos have chunks of it in their stool. I have since switched over to peat moss. For all of you that use vermiculite have you ever ran across this problem before? I can only assume that it is harmful to the Leo.

Thanks

i used it in a few lay boxes last year, i also noticed a large amount of it in their stools, i now use BED-A-BEAST and peat moss and havn't came across a single problem yet

Same here. I used vermiculite for some time but the leos were pooping gold logs. I didn't like that so I changed to coconut fiber which I’ve been using for the past 2 years and I love it!

i have never used it in nest boxes but i do use it to incubate and every once in a while you get a hatchling that poops it first "poop cork" out and its a bit shiny

Poop Cork !!!!!

lmao

why does everyone laugh at poop cork? when i was a kid we raised horses when we had a foal on the ground one of the many things we had to do was give it an enima... well once it was given and you stand back cuz it shoots out you take the hard "poop cork" as my dad called it to me , he called it the sh!t cork to the vet..... so he would fool around its poo find the cork (holding it in its hand, its pretty hard) and send me off to get the after birth he and the vet would examine it and then i had the chore of burying it (so buzzards amd coyoptes couldnt come)... do you real how heavy and nastey and gross that after birth was YUCK... anyway back to the poop cork i am sure their is a name for it but thats all i ever knew... its kinda like the word "taint" you know what it is and you know there is a scientific word for it but you have no clue what that word is

ROBIN!!! It's scientific name is CRAP ROCKET

close relative to the famous "snot rocket"

no it really does have a scientific name... i think the taints is perenium or something like that

I can only assume that it is harmful to the Leo.

Why is that?

Originally Posted by Glenn Bartley

Why is that?

Well, any kind of substrate that is ingested like that can cause impaction. Another reason is I’ve heard that vermiculite has a certain amount of asbestos in it. I didn’t want to take any chances so I changed.