Are you interested in feeding your pet the right and know about all the good foods that you can use? Well, in the following article we will be discussing all of it in detail and you can know what the iguanas love to eat and what you should feed them.
We will be covering the best and the important foods for iguana. You can even get some tips regarding how to feed the iguana.
Contents
What do iguanas eat?
Iguanas are herbivores pets that we can say are leaf eaters. So if you want to feed your pet in the right way, then you need to give it dark green leafy vegetables. The pet even enjoys the fruits, flowers, commercial food and even non leafy vegetables.
Before we get to see the best food for iguanas, we need to know about these lizards. It is important that the pet owners discover which species they own and what life they have in the wild.
Best Foods For Iguana to feed
Let us see the different foods Iguanas can have:
Leaves
We know that green iguanas are the herbivores or in other words the leaf eaters. They basically live on a leaf diet from vines and trees or also have plants and fruits mixed with it.
Your iguana pet has some dietary needs and preferences which are in respect to the life in the wild.
You can easily provide the pet with some food that is nutritious, and that herbivores can easily enjoy.
So according to this the best food that you can possibly give is the dark green or leafy vegetables.
These vegetables should be a part of 90% of your pet diet. The vegetables would involve beet grebes, mustard greens, collard greens, cabbage, clover, savvy, cilantro, Swiss chard, alfalfa and much more.
You need not give your pet vitamin and nutrient deficient vegetables like the celery, romaine lettuce or the celery.
These vegetables have fiber and a very less nutrient value which is not suitable for your pet. Also, another thing that you need to note is that the light collared parts of the vegetables are less nutritious as compared to the others. Your main goal should be that you provide your pet a nutrient rich diet.
Vegetables
There are a lot of other vegetables which are non leafy and is a good choice for the iguanas. These vegetables can be served raw or cooked as per the choice.
You also need to be sure that you do not rely only on the non leafy vegetables. You can even include the bell peppers, green beans and also broccoli.
The vegetables are safe and healthy for the iguana and also make a small parentage of the diet.
You can use squash, cactus, cucumbers, mushrooms, corn, shredded carrots as well as peas.
Fruit
Iguanas love to eat fruit and you should give it only in small amounts as it is poor in minerals the fruits should not be a major part of the iguana’s diet.
Consider giving your pet the fruit treat once in a week or as toppings on the food. The friendly fruits for an iguana involve pears, tomatoes, kiwis, melons, mango and even peaches.
Some of the other healthy fruits are apricots, strawberries, figs and dates.
Flowers
The pet eats flowers in the wild and therefore feeding your pet with flowers looks like a good idea.
Flowers such as hibiscus, geraniums, roses and dandelions can be a good choice for this purpose you need to be sure that it does not have any chemically sprayed on it.
Commercial foods
Your iguana pet needs a diet of 80-90% leaves. These must involve fresh greens, vegetables and even fruit. You can easily feed your pet with this food and you can supplement it with a good commercial made food source.
Adult Iguana Food
Med Natural Iguana Food Formula
Exo Terra Soft Juvenile Iguana Food
Animal protein
Some of the iguanas may even like eating animal protein food sources. These involve crickets, mealworms, mice and also table food.
These are not necessary for you to feed your pet. These can even prove to be the poor dietary choices for your pet. So it is better that you offer your pet these foods infrequently.
Also make sure that you never feed your iguana with fat or Vitamin D.
How to Feed your Iguana in right way?
Iguanas don’t chew food, and you need to be sure that while you feed your iguana pet cut all your vegetables and fruits into pieces. If they swallow these it might lead to a choking condition and especially for the baby iguanas.
Give your iguanas the healthy leaves and vegetables which they consume all easily. You can add more to it.
If any food is left behind, you need to clean it and discard the leftovers.
Baby iguanas might need some extra food and are required to be fed three times in a day.
Conclusion
So at the end of the article we see that the best food that you can give your iguanas is the dark green vegetables and dark green leafy ones.
These should be about 80-90% of their diet
Other vegetables that the iguanas can enjoy are carrots, bell peppers and even cucumbers. Some fruits can even be helpful and help in supplementing the diet of iguana.
You can go through all the details mentioned above to be double sure regarding what to feed your pet and what is the most suitable for the diet.
