Foods for Reptiles, Turtles & Fish

A lot of what sits on our food shelf was a fish, reptile or turtle food long before invert keepers picked it up, and some customers buy it for exactly those animals. This page gathers the foods that suit reptiles, aquatic turtles and terrapins, and aquarium and pond fish: dried insects, whole dried fish and shrimp, freeze-dried daphnia, flakes, wafers, floating sticks and gel diets you mix at home. For reptiles and turtles they are extras and treats on top of their everyday food; for fish, the flakes and wafers can carry more of the everyday feeding.

Reptiles

Insect-eating lizards that will take food that isn't moving, bearded dragons among them, often eat dried calciworms as an extra. Black soldier fly larvae (Hermetia illucens) carry many times the calcium of mealworms, and a few minutes in warm water softens them. If your reptile eats live insects, Repashy Bug Burger feeds and waters crickets, roaches and mealworms from one tub, so they are well fed when they go in. How long to feed them first is in our gut loading guide. For live help inside the vivarium, see our guide to a clean-up crew for bearded dragons.

Turtles and terrapins

A turtle pellet or stick made for everyday feeding is the staple, with greens for the species that eat plants. On top of that, whole dried shrimp, daphnia, silkworm pupae, calciworms and dried fish such as sprats and anchovies are the treats most aquatic turtles take eagerly. Break the larger pieces up for young animals, and keep treats to a small share of what goes into the water. Our guide to dried treats for turtles and terrapins covers how to offer them, how much is too much, and calcium and light.

Aquarium and pond fish

Flakes and floating sticks feed at the surface; sinking wafers and Repashy Bottom Scratcher reach corydoras, plecos, loaches and freshwater shrimp on the bottom; daphnia and freeze-dried peas add variety. Flakes and sticks go in by the pinch, as much as your fish clear in a couple of minutes. Wafers and gel are grazed slowly, often after dark, so feed what the tank clears overnight and lift out anything left in the morning. Our guide to food for shrimp tanks and bottom feeders covers the bottom of the tank, fish by fish.

Guides

Two guides go further: what daphnia is and which animals eat it, and calciworms against mealworms, with the calcium numbers behind the comparison.

Questions keepers ask

Can turtles eat dried shrimp?

Yes, as a treat. Whole dried shrimp are a favourite with most aquatic turtles and terrapins, but keep a turtle pellet or stick as the staple and offer shrimp on top.

Are dried calciworms good for reptiles?

They are a useful extra for reptiles that accept dried food: unlike mealworms, black soldier fly larvae have a positive calcium-to-phosphorus ratio. Most insect-eating reptiles still prefer live prey, so treat them as a supplement.

Can I feed these foods to chickens?

No. UK feed rules restrict the animal protein farmed birds can be given, and that includes backyard hens, so we do not sell our dried insects, shrimp or fish for poultry.

Can garden birds have calciworms?

Yes, in small amounts scattered on the ground, since the RSPB now advises against bird tables and other flat-surfaced feeders. Soak them in spring and summer, when adults may carry them to chicks, and clear any left by dusk: hedgehog rescues advise against calciworms and mealworms for hedgehogs. Our guide to what robins eat has the rest of the advice.

The rest of our food shelf, chosen for isopods, millipedes, springtails and roaches, is in invertebrate food and supplements.