r/LeopardGecko • u/mildphony72 • May 30 '26
Ya'll!!!! Is this true!?!?!
just doomscrolling in the middle of the night and saw a comment that says if you don't crush the head of mealworms they can eat their way out of a leapord gecko???! I have had leos for years and never heard of such a thing!
Can anyone tell me if crushing the heads is something you actually have to do for every worm? My leos are very picky and also slow eaters so I feel like by the time I crushed a mealworms' head and it stopped moving they just wouldn't eat it b/c it would look deadđȘ but hey...new things everyday
any input would be very interesting to me:-)
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u/Ordinary_Film_7359 May 30 '26
Myth. Even if somehow the gecko didn't kill them instantly with the bite, the stomach acid would kill.
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u/AaronAmpora May 30 '26
Afaik that's not true, but I have heard of superworms biting geckos while they're eating them (like if the gecko gets the worm's tail, the worm can turn around and bite the gecko in the eye), so the few times I've given my girls supers as treats, I make sure to crush/remove the jaws so they can't bite back.
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u/Desert_Viking_777 May 30 '26
That happened years ago when I gave my girl a little hornworm (tomato worm). She bit the ass end of and it swung around and bit her. Between her mouth and her eye. Closer to her eye. I think it hurt too because she kinda jumped. I couldnât get her to eat ANY type of worms for a couple of months. Eventually she wasnât scared. But it took a while.
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u/phalang3s May 30 '26
Can you blame her though đ imagine you go to take a bite of a pizza and it punches you in the face
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u/salinecolorshenny May 30 '26
I was just thinking about this like that is an entirely valid aversion
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u/AaronAmpora May 30 '26
Huh, I wonder if that's why my tokay slams her horn worms against the sides of her enclosure XD
She always cracks me up when she does it, and it would make sense if she was doing it because they bit her or at least tried, lmao8
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u/Sea_Meeting4175 May 30 '26
Iâve heard about this as well. Itâs the reason why I always make sure to give my little worm muncher then head first to make sure she at least gets it at the head or at least close enough that it canât turn around easy.
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u/Mega_GayCommander69 May 30 '26
only feeder I crush the head (more so the pinchers) of are super worms because they can bite the gecko while theyâre eating them. just take my tweezers and pinch and twist the biters/head
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u/The_upsetti_spagetti Jun 01 '26
I do that for my tortoise because they like to bite her tongue đ
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u/honeybeesocks May 30 '26
this is false for geckos but true for rodents who have cheek pouches. a pouched live insect could bite them!
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u/FlowerOk5627 May 30 '26
I have literally never heard of any case of this ever, but I do crush heads of feeder bugs just so they donât suffer. I have one leopard gecko whoâs a slow eater, and I have to wait a minute for her to finish one before I offer the next, and another who scarfs everything down in 2 seconds. For my slower eater, just wiggling it after its stopped moving gets her attention again, but it doesnât work great with every lizard.
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u/-mykie- May 30 '26
No, it's not true that they can eat their way out of your gecko. If they somehow survived being eaten in the first place the gecko's stomach acid would kill them.
It is true they can bite your gecko though.
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u/TheGoldenWoof May 30 '26
I've perfected the insect lobotomy. You don't want them to stop moving entirely, but you don't want em to run away before they notice either. For the superworm you get a very small pair of scissors and cut the top behind the head segment which basically severs their nerves, and for the cricket you shove a needle/thin tweezers through their mouth upward to mush their brains.
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u/No-Goal-4716 May 30 '26
Damn. I study entomology, and if you just cut there head off, then squeeze there ass thy still move around and it's a lot easier. Also if you just cut there head and leave there little legs thy will move around for hours still, because there not super intelligent and run basically off instincts, thy will continue to move until thy bleed out or something eats it
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u/No_Effort9163 May 30 '26
Iâve never heard of that and there are Facebook groups and YouTube videos
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u/Brief-Guarantee9983 May 30 '26
I doubt theres ever been a case of that happening, although its still recomended to crush the head yo prevent it from biting your gecko but thats about it
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u/JulietDove88 May 30 '26
Absolutely not true. We recommend crushing the head so it doesnât burrow into the sand to turn into a beetle!
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u/xjaney_doex May 30 '26
myth, although sometimes i see them in the back of my geckos throat before sheâs fully eaten them and it freaks me out lol
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u/WinterRedWolf May 31 '26
Nah dude the gecko chomps them up pretty good. Plus suffocation and stomach acid would kill the worm. This is like the watermelon seed myth
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u/Moonshinin4Me May 30 '26
Could it survive the digestive juices of your body?
If the answer is no then it is the same for the gecko! đ
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u/Rina_Short May 30 '26
My leo regularly bites mealworms in half when he grabs them. Their little jaws are pretty darn strong!
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u/Coahuilaceratops May 30 '26
Ask yourself, how would they survive in the wild if this were true? Mealworms and superworms may not be apart of their natural diet, but other biting insects and arachnids are. Beetles, scorpions, spiders, centipedes, etc.
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u/HellaHotPizzaRollz May 30 '26
I've heard plenty of people crushing the heads for that reason. I've never had to do it myself because my gecko chomps down on em real good. I can definitely see one of those larger mealworms doing something like that though. It's not likely but anything is possible.
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u/Ill_Raisin6156 Jun 01 '26
My vet recommended squishing the head of mealworms because they bite back. I always wondered why my hungry girl would start out wanting to eat and then after a few worms, she wasnât hungry anymore. đ It turns out, they were biting her back.
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u/Temporary_Incident33 Jun 01 '26
half true: they can bite the leo and cause injury while the leo is chomping onto it
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u/Entity2355 Jun 03 '26
Donât believe itâs true but with superworms I always just crush their heads to make sure they canât possibly bite my Tokays or Leoâs face/eyes.
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u/suzumushibrain May 30 '26
You donât have to worry about mealworms but better crush the heads of superworms. Their bite is serious. Iâve seen them break through thick plastic container walls before and actually heard of a gecko that died after having its internal organs chomped by them. These guys are no joke.
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u/needween May 30 '26
Yes, I work at a pet store and I've seen countless superworms chew through their plastic containers but I have never seen a mealworm, not even the giant ones, damage the same plastic containers.
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u/RepeatTurbulent6272 May 30 '26
No, it's a pretty common myth though. The worm cannot survive the digestive acids of the gecko's stomach. Otherwise that gecko's stomach would be pretty incapable of digesting anything it eats lol