I've done a TON of research in deciding what diet to feed my glider. I know beyond a doubt that BML does provide an excellent source of the nutrients gliders need, and I would never advise anyone to stop using it. But I found a very informative essay by a vet in Australia who has some reservations about the mix as a good calcium source. His point was that nobody really knows what freezing does to the nutrients in rep-cal and that he wouldn't want to garuantee the gliders were getting enough viable calcium in this way. This is not meant to be a criticism of the diet, just some food for thought.

I think there are equal amounts of people that don't feed BML, as well as, those that do feed it. We're always up for learning more diet info!

There has always been questions regarding the use of reptile vitamins, too. I tried feeding it a couple of years ago, but my gliders would not eat it.

There are many who do use it and swear by it, tho.

Rita, what do you use? Every where I have been says to use Rep-Cal, is there something else?

yeah, i use rep-cal too. i have about one and a half of the stuff, so i don't want to not use what i have (it is kind of pricey) if it isn't bad for them, but if there is something better i would deff get that next time instead.

I feed mine HPW, so I dont use rep-cal at all. I use High Protein Wombaroo powder. And balance their fruits and veggies so they get proper calcium to phosphorus ratios.

If BML with calcium suppliment didn't provide enough calcium in their diet then I would think we would hear more issues with hind leg paralisis. I've used it for two years now without a problem (crossing fingers). Imho if an issue is serious just like with human care I would get several opinons from different vets.

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Originally posted by charis2770

I've done a TON of research in deciding what diet to feed my glider. I know beyond a doubt that BML does provide an excellent source of the nutrients gliders need, and I would never advise anyone to stop using it. But I found a very informative essay by a vet in Australia who has some reservations about the mix as a good calcium source. His point was that nobody really knows what freezing does to the nutrients in rep-cal and that he wouldn't want to garuantee the gliders were getting enough viable calcium in this way. This is not meant to be a criticism of the diet, just some food for thought.

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Do you have a link to the essay by chance?

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Originally posted by Sigmar

Imho if an issue is serious just like with human care I would get several opinons from different vets.

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One of the huge problems is - the majority of vets out there dont have a clue what gliders should be eating to maintain good health.

You can also use gilder-cal by exotic nutrition which is made for gliders. Most diets recommend to not mix in the calcium/vitamins before freezing as freezing damages these compounds, but rather to sprinkle over the food just before feeding and store in a cool dry place away from light. You can also get glider-booster from exotic nutrition as a source of other vitamins.

The vets I have spoken to hear that know about Australian native animals firstly don't like using reptile vitamins for Sugar Gliders. The diet at the Sanctuary use to use sustigen and now uses bird vitamins both a calcium suppliment and a multi vitamin suppliment.

I personally do not recommend BML as a diet, it has way to much Iron in it and gliders cannot process the iron out of there bodies and it can lead to kidney and liver damage years down the track. It does not compare to the Leadbeaters nectar used hear in Australia.

Too many vitamins can be as bad as not enough.

Just thought I would make a comment about vets. Most vets do not understand Sugar Gliders. They do not cover them at university an these animals have special needs when it comes to stuff like antibiotics and aspecially there digestion. Even hear in Australia we have a few vets who have native animal knowedge. The Healesville sanctuary has a special contact for vets world wide to be able to get info from the Animal hospital, any vet can register via the web site.
Just beacue a vet says a diet looks good without having knowledge about this animal really doesn't convince me the diet is good. Be careful to believe everything a vet says.

Hi Jett - This issue came up before recently, and I quoted you in regards to the high iron content in BML. Can you tell me what is in the BML diet that is the source of the excess iron? BTW - I don't feed BML because mine refused to eat it after a time, but A LOT of folks here do feed BML as a basic diet.

I for one use it. A modified BML diet. So yes what is in it that is high in iron? If we knew maybe we could cut back a little of what it is.

regarding iron, see www.sugarglider.com/nutrition/viewrecipe.asp?item=1 and scroll down to the minerals section. If you hover your mouse over the Iron graph, it's the baby food and reptile vitamins adding significant amounts of iron. The Australian babyfood that this American versions supposedly is a replacement for has less than half as much iron.

So what is the benifit of the wheat germ?? Also what is leadbeaters nectar and who carries it??

Thanks Eric.

the leadbeaters nectar s something that is made up and used in Zoos hear in Australia. The high protein baby cereal is not available in the States so BML is a supposably substitute for it. However it is nothing like it and includes yoghurt which is not in the original, nor is the reptile vitamins nor the juice. Check out the link below and you can compare the two.

Heres the link with The Healesville Sanctuary diets.
(Healesville Sanctuary is a Australian Native Animal Zoo and have been breeding Sugar Gliders since the early 1960's, they are still doing research on Wild Sugar Gliders. They see no need to develop there Sugar Glider diet as they have had no health issues with their gliders for many years, this was told to us by one of the vets in there animal hospital.

http://www.wildlifevictoria.org.au/Pdf%20Docs/HS%20Current%20Diets.pdf The Sugar Glider diet is on page 22

I do not personally use this nectar mix but use a similar ingriedience, and do use the bird calcium and bird vitamins.

Just a note on the Wombaroo High Protein suppliment. The Zoos hear also do not use this for Sugar Gliders.

I dont know of any study that has ever been done here in the US on how to feed gliders. Its a shame really. They have certainly been here long enough.

Sadly, most of us are feeding our gliders on a wing and a prayer that we are doing it correctly.

Rita, I agree with you, we don't know that much about the gilder diet so we are feeding them on a wing and a prayer

That's true Rita. The thing is that many of us have not had our gliders long enough to know if there diet has caused them any health problems. Liver and kidney damge do seem to go along with the gliders not being able to process too many vitamins and it does seem to take a few years before these problems are seen. Short term I think these diets are ok and can restore health to sick and weak Sugar Gliders however we will not know the outcome long term on these diets till we are down the track away and by that time it will be too late for many. I do think we all need to look at the calcium to phosphorus ratios of fruit and veg when we are not introducing other forms of calcium into there diets. I know its scarey to think too many vitamins is dangerous and not enough may cause other problems.