All species in the Rhacodactylus genus are frugivorous. A frugivorous diet consists of ripe fruit and insects. Insects are easy to come by and with the introduction of balanced diets, the feeding of a frugivorous gecko is simple and easy.
Feeding Babyfood to Geckos
For years babyfood was believed to be a suitable diet for geckos. A mixture of added vitamins, calcium, and other dietary supplements were added in an effort to turn a human food into a reptile diet. Unfortunately for the majority of reptiles on this diet they formed diseases that were never documented while in the wild. These diseases included Floppy Tail Syndrome, obesity and the most critical Metabolic Bone Disease. Metabolic Bone Disease along with obesity were the two most common factors since babyfood did not provide a balanced calcium, phosphorus and vitamin supplement. Most cases of Metabolic Bone Disease do not return to proper health and either live their life out with deformation or die. Two people developed balanced diets for Crested Geckos and eventually the entire genus of Rhacodactylus were able to benefit from years of development and reformulation. Today we have Clarks Frugivorous Gecko Diet and Repashy Superfoods. A great finding on the effects of a babyfood diet is that of Dr Alan's post on the Repashy Forums found Gecko Resource Forums.
Feeding Frugivorous Geckos
In recent years balanced diets that require only adding water and mixing to a semi-thick consistency have been introduced into the hobby. These diets, such as Repashy Superfoods, can come in different flavors to appeal to even the pickiest of geckos. I find that my geckos prefer the Repashy Superfoods 2 Part Diet with flavors such as Cherry, Fig and the ever popular Rose. The most recent formula of Crested Gecko Diet, also by Repashy Superfoods, contains rose along with a number of other flavors appealing to geckos far more than the previous formula. You can find Crested Gecko Diet at Reptile Specialty.
I feed the frugivorous diet three times a week and leave the remaining food in the enclosure until the following night. This allows the gecko to feed at any point that it may become hungry. Also, in nature these geckos feed on ripe (not spoiled) fruit which naturally occurs on the second evening that the diet is available. Giant Geckos will feed on 2+ ounces a night and crested geckos may feed on only a teaspoon. I like to offer a little more than what they are capable of eating. For my breeder cages of Crested Geckos that have one male and up to two females I will offer 1.5 ounces and for my Giant Geckos with one individual gecko in the enclosure I offer a full 2 ounces.
Calcium, Mineral and Vitamin Supplements
All species in the Rhacodactylus genus are nocturnal. Unlike Diurnal lizard species, Rhacodactylus can not process Calcium naturally, and supplementing calcium and vitamin D3 is necessity for most nocturnal captive reptiles. The diets are formulated with the necessary amounts of calcium and D3 but live feeders are not. All live feeders will need to be balanced with the right calcium, phosphorus and vitamin D3 amounts. Applying supplements is as simple as using a plastic bag, (provided when crickets are sold at pet stores) adding a small amount of supplement to the bag with the crickets inside and shaking the bag until crickets are finely coated with the supplement.
Calcium supplements available today are sold seperate from vitamins and minerals. Generally a company will supply two products. A Calcium product with or without D3 and a vitamin mineral product. Companies will offer these three products as a way to select the right calcium product for your diurnal or nocturnal pet and then later mix with the vitamin and mineral product. If you use ReptiCalcium by Zoo-Med then you will want to add a vitamin/mineral supplement. If you happen to come across Insect Cricket Balancer, also known as Calcium Plus, by Repashy Superfoods then you will not have to worry about mixing calcium with vitamins since the thought behind the product is to balance the crickets present nutritional value to an appropriate meal.
Live Feeders
All geckos in the genus will feed on live insects during some point of growth. Crested Geckos and Mossy Prehensile-Tailed geckos will feed on insects throughout their life while Gargoyles will only feed on insects after they reach Juvenile and just prior to their adult years. Giant Geckos are the pickiest of eaters when it comes to live prey.
Giant Geckos reach a point where they are no longer stimulated by the appearance of crickets and at this point offering roaches once a week or hairless baby mice once every two weeks may be more appealing. Gargoyle Geckos may not eat live feeders and can solely consume the frugivorous diets.
On days that I offer live feeders I have not offered the diet and allowed the geckos to digest and absorb the required nutrients. I dust the live feeder with either Repashy Cricket Balancer or Zoo-Med Repti Calcium with D3. This way I know the gecko is getting the right nutrition from the supplements and the chances of offering too much Calcium/D3 or not enough has been drastically reduced.
Something most people overlook is "gut loading". Gut loading consists of feeding your crickets, roaches, or other live prey a nutritional meal prior to being offered to your reptile as food. The idea stems from the food chain. In nature the cricket will feed on a great deal of available foods and predators will feed on the cricket also consuming the stomach contents of the cricket. Now if you feed the cricket left over Crested Gecko Diet or Insect Gut Load from Repashy Superfoods the stomach contents of the cricket will have a greater nutritional value.
Weekly Feeding Schedule
At the start of the week, on Monday, I offer the frugivorous diet leaving the food in the enclosure until Wednesday when I refresh the diet and allow for it to be available until Friday again repeating the process but removing the diet on Saturday. At this point the food has been offered fresh three times during the course of the week. The remaining food has been in the enclosure, ripe, for three days and continued to be consumed at a greater rate. I do not feed the geckos on Saturday but offer live feeders on Sunday. Each gecko will be offered enough crickets to be consumed in that one feeding.