You might have a few tomatoes in your refrigerator and you might be wondering “can bearded dragons eat tomatoes?”
Bearded dragons are capable of eating many different types of food ranging from insects to fruits, to vegetables
Some things they should definitely not eat (chicken and beef) and of course, you don’t want to hurt your beardie so you are double-checking
when in doubt don’t feed it to your bearded dragon. that is rule number one for me
Bearded dragons can eat tomatoes but it has to be restricted and I will talk about that now
New Bearded Dragon owners usually have many questions and I will try to answer as many as possible in this post
Can Bearded Dragons Eat Tomatoes?
Yep but you need to restrict it to only once or twice a month
I feed my bearded dragon tomatoes very rarely and when I do they are in his salad
You have to serve tomatoes to your bearded dragon a certain way
us Humans can literally just take a bite out of it and not worry at all but there are certain things inside tomatoes that can hurt your beardie so you need to remove them
How to serve tomatoes to your bearded dragon
Cut out all the pulp, seeds, and stems from the tomato and give it a thorough wash
tomatoes are known to have a lot of pesticides and chemicals on them so it’s important to wash all that crap off
Bearded dragons don’t have an immune system as complicated and efficient as humans do and can’t deal with the toxins as well as humans can
When prepping don’t feed the entire tomato to them. You want to cut it up into pieces and only serve up to a quarter of the actual tomato
Any more than that is too much for them
Tomato nutrients for Bearded Dragons
Tomatoes have a lot of health benefits for Bearded dragons and humans as well
tomatoes have vitamin A, C, and Vitamin K
Tomatoes also contain lycopene which actually helps prevent cancer and reduces inflammation in the body
One thing you have to be careful of is sugar content for bearded dragons
Sugar can actually cause a lot of digestive irritation and inflammation
it’s tough to actually gauge how much they can have but keep it as low as possible
Tomatoes are also very low in oxalates. Oxalates bind to calcium which can stop the calcium from being absorbed into the bloodstream
This will end up causing metabolic bone disease eventually.
Metabolic bone disease is a nasty disease that can eventually kill your bearded dragon so you want to avoid that as much as possible
Can too much tomato hurt your bearded dragon?
When many owners are looking for information they will often do this either right before and just after they purchase their bearded dragon
To be quite honest with you, there are better alternatives than tomatoes to help get your bearded dragon the nutrients it needs
issues with too much tomato consumption are
- Phosphorus content is too high
- Vitamin A overload
- Acid content too high for beardies
Too much Phosphorus is not very good for your bearded dragon since it acts like oxalates do by binding to your bearded dragons calcium
When this happens your bearded dragon will have a hard time absorbing calcium which will again lead to Metabolic bone disease
Your bearded dragon should only be consuming food that has a phosphorus and calcium ratio of 1:1 or 2:1
Too much vitamin A – Vitamin A toxicity can happen if you feed them too many fruits and vegetbles too often without giving them a break or changing up their mix of food
Vitamin A toxicity looks like this
- tired and lethargic
- swelling
- dehydration
- they will put on some weight
Now this can easily be countered just by giving them a break and giving them some more protein that week or more time off of food
Your bearded dragon doesn’t actually need to eat as much as you might think it does
Too much acid in the stomach will cause your bearded dragons stomach to be irritated. Acid can really bug your beardies digestive system out and cause inflammation
This is why you need to avoid too much citrus acid in your beardies diet like oranges
Now tomatoes don’t actually have nearly the amount of citrus acid an orange or lemon will have but extended use will end up causing dehydration and diarrhea
How often can bearded dragons eat tomatoes?
Bearded dragons can have tomatoes around 1 – 2 times a month
They are actually not that bad but because the phosphorus content and acid content is too high do need to be avoided
Other fruits that bearded dragons can and should eat
I made a list of other fruits that bearded dragons can eat a lot more of without having to worry
- Apples
- bananas
- grapes
- cabbage
- blueberries
- blackberries
- Cantaloupe
- mango
- strawberries
- green beans
- sweet potato
- bell peppers
- acorn squash
- yellow squash
- pineapple
- broccoli
Summary and ongoing questions
Its really easy to overthink what to feed your bearded dragon and the number 1 rule is to never feed them something you’re unsure of
Now i also don’t want you to over think or stress what will happen to them. They have very little to worry about in captivity vs in the wild
in the wild they have many more things to stress over like predators and i don’t want you to take on any more stress either
Feeding your bearded dragon human food is ok but you should stay away from meats and poultry mostly
tons of fruit and vegetables will be fine just make sure you give them time between a lot of fruit consumption
I like to feed my bearded dragon quite a bit of fruit for about a week every single month
Then during the following three weeks he wont have any fruit
This helps with the sugar content as well. too much sugar will cause diabetes and inflammation to run rampant if you give them too much fruit
Humans can deal with it much more efficiently compared to bearded dragons
