feeding blood worms

[jaleely]

(cross-posted at sSnakeSs.com)

SO, I was at the fish store today getting some guppies to feed my fresh water catfish...and I thought I'd try some live blood worms for my baby garters. I hadn't read that it would hurt them, only that they may not eat them.
So i put some in a dish for each of them, and added a little water so the worms would really wiggle around. Set them each in their perspective feed boxes...and the male is pretty shy, so he hid. The female however came out and watched the worms, then proceeded to act confused, and just want out of the box (tupperware).
So i took some trout i'd been feeding them, and put just a dash in the dish with the worms.

Female came out and sniffed around....then went crazy eat and eating *lol*
She accidentally came across the little bit of trout while trying to get a mouthfull of worms, and carried that around for a bit, then swallowed that down too. She's been in there now being fat and trying to eat every last little bit of worm. She keeps going in the water and hunting away.

The male i've noticed, wants to hide.....unless he sees the female out. So i put the tupperwares next to each other and turned them so he could see her moving around in her tub. He came right now, and started hunting.
Very interesting behavior! I've only fed them a couple of times, but i've seen him act timid until he sees her eating. Cute really.

So, now he's also eating worms...he too came across the piece of trout by accident while he was opening and shutting his mouth repeatedly in the water trying to catch ONE blood worm....which for those of you who know...blood worms are REALLY tiny tiny worms, and trying to catch one by itself is really silly. He was just om-nomming om-nomming then suddenly...trout! He looked so confused *lol* but of course swallowed it right down.
He's been over there testing the water and still trying to catch them one at a time, though i did see him get a couple clumps (blood worms mostly clump together).

So very cute!
Have you fed blood worms before? Do you know if it's healthy for them?


BTW I still need names for these guys. : )

[-MARWOLAETH-]

They are larvae of a fly which is an arthropod,arthropods have an exo skeleton made of chitin which Garters can't digest so it may cause impaction.It's safer to stick with earthworms and fish.

[guidofatherof5]

Family Chironomidae.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chironomidae
Not sure what to say. I would have concerns about parasites and or the fact they can come from heavily polluted waters.
I think some research needs to be done on whether they are safe or not.
In the face of no clear cut evidence that they are I would consider them unsafe.
Just my opinion.

[-MARWOLAETH-]

They are available in frozen blocks that you just plop into water Terrapins and axalotls love them.wouldn't freezing get rid of parasites and other nasty things?

[jaleely]

Hmm. Well, it was fun to watch them eat it, but i won't try it again because I'd rather have them be safe.
I know fish eat them (hence they were at the fish store lol) I just figured a worm was a worm, in regards to these particular kind. I think there are many kinds refered to as blood worms. It was my understanding these were actual worms, not larvae. I will look into it more!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumbriculus_variegatus

I'm still looking, but these act more like worms, where has you can cut them into pieces and each piece lives. They have segments, and no heads such as the larvae do. I'd rather them be safe though!

[kimbosaur]

The bloodworms definitely have an exoskeleton. When you defrost them and take a closer look, you can see it. Also, although I've never seen live bloodworms at the fish store, we used to feed some other type of live worms (I think black worms?) to get some of our picky discus eating and they would almost always end up with parasites.

[jaleely]

That's horrible! Okay def not going to feed those again even if there's only a slim chance.
These are def worms, smooshy gooshy worms, and sometimes pet stores name them black works, or other kinds, and sometimes blood worms. This store i know breeds them, and i never had my fish come down with anything (had them for 7 years now) and we have even feed them to our salt water fish...still not worth the risk though.
aww! boo. lol

[-MARWOLAETH-]

Some animals have evolved the way to digest the insect exo skeleton,the ones that can digest it have an enzyme called chitinase.... which garters lack.

[guidofatherof5]

It was said once on the forum that if you scented a lego correctly they would eat those( I believe Stefan said this)
They are little garbage guts and don't give much thought to what they are eating.
It's up to us to see they don't eat legos

[Stefan-A]

It was said once on the forum that if you scented a lego correctly they would eat those( I believe Stefan said this)
They are little garbage guts and don't give much thought to what they are eating.
It's up to us to see they don't eat legos

Actually, it was in regards to them going into "feeding mode" and seeing pretty much anything as food.

Whether or not they recognize them correctly or incorrectly, is the issue. This is something that has popped up from time to time, with garters identifying anything from substrate to silicone in the enclosure as food and ending up trying to eat them. If it wasn't dangerous, I'd feed one of my snakes Legos just to prove that point.