This is some information we received from Dr. Emerson's wonderful presentation
Here is some info on NUTROBAL which Dr. Emerson recommends.....she has been working with a specialist in England who raises squirrels and has studied her diet/I went to the internet and found this it is a reptile supplement and Dr. Emerson said it was the best she has seen...I will be ordering it I am not sure if it is sold here in pet stores as all the sights are from UK that I have found so far. Some of the info is about reptiles and such there are 2 other products they sell and talk about however the one we would be interested in is "Nutrobal"....
I hope this will be of some help for calcium issues...also not only is it safe to sprinkle just a small amount over their food DAILY Dr. Emerson suggests that as well as Also 20 to 30 minutes DAILY of sunlight.
Nutrobal is a calcium balancer and multivitamin supplement to help growth in snakes, lizards and tortoises.
It is high in calcium and vitamin D3 which are essential to maintain proper bone growth in reptiles.
It also contains other important vitamns and minerals.
It is especially important for young growing animals and breeding animals.
It can be dusted onto food.
Nutrobal Calcium Balancer - Supplement For Reptiles
Nutrobal Calcium Balancer - Supplement For Reptiles
A high potency calcium balancer & multivitamin supplement to help bone growth in lizards & tortoises.
Nutabol is a veterinary developed vitamin/ mineral supplement specifically formulated as a high calcium "balancer " for insectivorous reptiles and birds, to assist in correcting the inadequate levels of calcium present in live insectivorous foods such as crickets and mealworms.
The Calcium:Phosphorus ratio is very important in ensuring healthy bone growth, and reproductive function and this potent supplement with a Ca:P ratio of 46:1 is extremely valuable in correcting deficient diets.
Nutrobal is particularly important for those species fed primarily on insects such as mealworms or locusts. Nutrobal can be used as a dusting powder.
Some species fed mainly lean meat also benefit from the use of Nutrobal, as will growing chelonia which need calcium for their shells and the larger lizards and crocodilia for their normal bone development.
Contents per gram: 200mg calcium and 150IU D3 plus vitamins A E K B1 B2 B6 B12 C, folic acid, nicotinic & pantothenic acids, biotin choline inositol niacin and minerals Na Fe Co I Mn Zn Se Cu.
Vetark Nutrobal is a product we highly recommend. It is a vitamin/mineral dusting powder.
Nutrobal is used worldwide by vets to correct dietary imbalances and by herpetologists for routine supplementation of growing reptiles and amphibians.
As animals grow to adulthood and their calcium needs fall then we suggest ARKVITS which also supplies significant levels of vitamins A, C and E which help in stressful times such as breeding.
ACE-High is a specialist supplement used to correct deficiencies in vitamin A, C or E, or when animals are especially stressed.
Typical calcium deficient foods which should be supplemented include:
* Crickets
* Mealworms
Can you overdose on Nutrobal?
In theory yes, in practice no. ie the same comment that applies to table salt. We've sold it for 20 years now and have never had a problem. Vets routinely overdose when treating metabolic bone disease in reptiles.
What exactly is Nutrobal?
Nutrobal is a high calcium vitamin mineral supplement, designed to 'balance' calcium deficient diets such as insects or meat especially, it is based around a very specific particle size of calcium which sticks to crickets etc. Its use has been the main reason for the decline in cases of metabolic bone disease over the last 15 years, it has been extraordinarily effective and its recommended by every UK reptile vet that we are aware of.
If I dusted live foods purely in Nutrobal would I need to supplement with calci-dust?
If you dust with Nutrobal you don't need Calci-Dust, the reason for Calci-Dust comes from the increased use of better quality UV lights. When we first developed Nutrobal UV lights were either rubbish or dangerous, so we said use Nutrobal every day and just use full spectrum lighting. Now with full spectrum lighting combined with UV you could (but you would have to try quite hard) run into toxicity due to high D3 (because its also produced in the skin by the UV). Because of the theoretical risk (people also sometimes use other D3 sources as well which compound the problem) our advice is to use Nutrobal and Calci-Dust on alternate feedings if you have a quality UV source in the vivarium. Its simple and it works.
How often would you use (supplement diets with):
• Calci-dust
• Nutrobal
• Arkvits
We recommend dusting every feed. That way crickets are always dusted in something, this is important because reptiles come to realise that if they don't eat them at all then somebody will put brown untreated ones in at the next feed day. Of course if they leave the white ones long enough.
How many crickets should I put in?
Enough to be eaten in 15-20 minutes as a rough guide. If you put too many in then they clean the dusting powder off - depending on a variety of factors but often an hour or so. Don't leave crickets or locusts in the vivarium for too long, they will actually nibble the skin of snakes in particular.
I use nutrobal for my parrots and I also have chickens which at the moment are laying soft shelled eggs despite everything I have tried, I was wondering if it was ok to give nutrobal to the chickens as a way to increase the vitamin D3 they are getting.
Yes you can use Nutrobal as a Calcium Source for your Chickens.
My tortoises are too small to hibernate but are dozy all the time, as they are not eating anything I would like to know if it is possible to put Nutrobal in the water as they bathe.
Nutrobal is for dusting on the food, it isn't water soluble. If you are keeping the tortoises awake through the winter you will need a proper vivarium and heat lamp, otherwise they will simply stay half awake not eating and losing weight. Just bathing them daily isn't enough, they will have problems. Contact a local vet.
I purchased a tub of Nutrobal for regular dusting of crickets for my Leopard & Crested Geckos. Usually my Leopard Geckos are happy to eat a calcium supplement straight from a food bowl, and I was just wondering whether it is safe to use the Nutrobal in a similar fashion?
Nutrobal isn't formulated to be fed adlib from a bowl, it is designed for dusting onto food or coating crickets. That means they get the right level of D3 and the other vitamins in Nutrobal. So dust all your crickets with Nutrobal and leave access to calcium such as Calci-Dust in the food bowl.
I wondered if Nutrabal is ok to be the only source of calcium for young veiled chameleon females and whether once a week is sufficient
We would recommend Nutrobal and Calci-Dust on alternate feeds. If you only dust once a week then all that happens is that the animal avoids the odd looking white crickets because tomorrow there will be a brown one (or later that day!).
I keep seeing the bulletin boards say that vitamin D3 deteriorates fast - is it true??
Yes, vitamin D3 can deteriorate quickly. We are aware of a lot of debate on this and we have tried to clarify it.
The particular vitamin D3 we use has been tested in harsh conditions - up to 40degC and has been shown to deteriorate at a rate of less than 1% a month. We already include a small overage in the the product to compensate for this, so we are confident that meaningful levels are there well beyond the 6-9months that we recommend as the time you should change to a new pot!
Remember vitamin products are foods and should be replaced with fresh product.