# Which brand supplements?



## Mark Carden (Jul 25, 2018)

It is my understanding that flies should be dusted with calcium every feeding and vitamin A twice a month. What brand is preferred, Repashy or Rep-Cal?


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## SoloSK71 (Dec 25, 2018)

They all seem to do the job from the reading. Just make sure you don’t combine different ones and potentially dose too much of one or another vitamin.

Solo


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Rep Cal does not contain any Vitamin A that is usable by frogs. Rep Cal is not a complete vitamin supplement for frogs.

Dusting every feeding with Repashy Calcium Plus is an easy, foolproof, proven regimen. Dendrocare is another brand that is more expensive but would work well as a daily dusting product.


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## indrap (Aug 28, 2018)

I use dendrocare every feeding (every second day) for all my frogs and repashy superpig once every 6 days for some of my frogs. This regiment has worked great for me


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## Mark Carden (Jul 25, 2018)

Rep-Cal as a brand has Herptivite Multivitamin along with their calcium products. Josh’s Frogs list those 2 Rep-Cal products for their fruit fly culture kits.


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## PhylloBro (Sep 21, 2018)

Ive been turned to Repashy>Repcal by breeders ive spoken to at expos. I still use the Repcal herptivite multivitamin because i am not sure if there is Repashy alternative I havent really looked tbh but if there is i would use it. Also, this is completely anecdotal but Repashy seems to stay on the flies WAY longer than Repcal dust. just a personal observation.


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Mark Carden said:


> Rep-Cal as a brand has Herptivite Multivitamin along with their calcium products. Josh’s Frogs list those 2 Rep-Cal products for their fruit fly culture kits.


So much the worse for Josh's Frogs. Their promotion of that product does not change the fact that it has no retinol (which is Vitamin A that frogs can use), but rather has only beta carotine (which frogs -- and all other carnivores, AFAIK) cannot process to create Vitamin A.

Herptivite was popular in the 1990s and earlier, when there was a now-debunked scare regarding Vitamin A toxicity. Poke around using the search feature here, and I'm sure Ed has cited literature that establishes this.


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## JimM (Oct 2, 2018)

I used to mix Centrum in ground turkey balls for my black throat monitors back in the day. It's A to Zinc. 


As far as PDF's go, I was directed away from Herptivite and to Repashy by the gentlemen who bred my darts.

If he's breeding and raising healthy frogs and this is what he uses...good enough for me.


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## SoloSK71 (Dec 25, 2018)

Socratic Monologue said:


> So much the worse for Josh's Frogs. Their promotion of that product does not change the fact that it has no retinol (which is Vitamin A that frogs can use), but rather has only beta carotine (which frogs -- and all other carnivores, AFAIK) cannot process to create Vitamin A.
> 
> Herptivite was popular in the 1990s and earlier, when there was a now-debunked scare regarding Vitamin A toxicity. Poke around using the search feature here, and I'm sure Ed has cited literature that establishes this.


I am not promoting one over the other, but so that the entire facts are there, Josh's Frogs uses:

RepCal Calcium w/ D3

RepCal HerpeVite

Repashy Calcium Plus

Repashy Vitamin A Plus

Repashy SuperPig

Folic Acid and Zinc (for breeders)

Their froglets and frogs look healthy enough in the videos and pictures and compared to supplementing in a reef tank it is a simple enough schedule for me.

As always, YMMV

Solo


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## Mark Carden (Jul 25, 2018)

I was looking into fruit fly culture kits. Josh’s Frogs has Rep-Cal products with these kits. I know you can customize the kit and change the quantity to 0 and then add The Rehashpy products to my cart. Can frogs get their vitamin A using herptivite?


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## Encyclia (Aug 23, 2013)

I have had great luck with Repashy supplements. Most of the time when these threads come up, the consensus among folks on this board is to do Repashy Calcium Plus at every feeding and then every 2ish weeks use Repashy Vitamin A Plus (especially for breeders). Some of us also swap in Repashy Superpig. That seems pretty standard from the threads that I have read in the last few years. That's what I do, and it has worked pretty well for me. I had never tried DendroCare so recently bought some to try. I have heard good feedback from it. 

I don't know about other brands of supplements for dart frogs. I have read that some of the brands' multivitamins are deficient for some of the stuff our frogs need. I know what products to use for Repashy to get a good all-around supplementation regime. I have not tried to figure out how to work around the deficiencies in other brands of supplements. I would rather go with something that, as far as I know, has everything I need without having to rotate 6 different things. I can't possibly keep that straight in my head  Maybe someday a different regimen will be agreed on in the hobby. That hasn't happened yet, as far as I am aware. 

I guess the upshot is that I respect Josh's Frogs a great deal, but probably not enough to go against lots of other long-term breeders that I also respect who use mostly, if not completely, Repashy products. I am certainly open to other ways to do things (trying DendroCare now!), but I would like to see a bit more consensus before I stop doing what has worked for me for quite a while. 

It bears mentioning that whatever supplements you choose, make sure to buy them well before their expiration date, refrigerate them, and discard any remainder after 6 months. 

As Solo said, YMMV. Keep up the good discussion.

Mark


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## SoloSK71 (Dec 25, 2018)

Encyclia said:


> I would rather go with something that, as far as I know, has everything I need without having to rotate 6 different things. I can't possibly keep that straight in my head


Calcium
Magnesium
Cabonates
Reef Energy A
Reef Energy B
NO3
PO4
Iodine
Potassium
Iron
Bioactive Elements
Trace Colors

And I only have one tank.

Solo


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## Encyclia (Aug 23, 2013)

SoloSK71 said:


> Calcium
> Magnesium
> Cabonates
> Reef Energy A
> ...


Thanks so much for this example. It does represent a different perspective in how much effort to put into a hobby. This is exactly the reason that I got rid of my planted tank and it wasn't nearly that involved. Much of what I like about this hobby is that it doesn't require that level of engagement (though more engagement can sometimes pay dividends). I think it's great if you prefer to have that level of complexity in your vivarium hobby as well as your reef, but I am more of an Occam's Razor guy  If there are multiple solutions to a problem of varying complexities, I will drift toward the simple. 

YMMV, indeed  I bet your reef looks spectacular! Keep up the good work.

Mark


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## Mark Carden (Jul 25, 2018)

I currently have saltwater aquariums. I turned one of my 75 gallon aquariums into a vivarium. I breed some clownfish and brought them to a local fish store for credit. I used the credit for some large pieces of mopani wood for my vivarium build. I have multiple 5 gallon buckets culturing rotifers and a variety of copepods. I even culture phytoplankton. I am now culturing multiple types of isopods. When weather is warmer I will be getting my first dart frog. I definitely want to keep things simpler than the saltwater hobby!


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Mark Carden said:


> I was looking into fruit fly culture kits. Josh’s Frogs has Rep-Cal products with these kits. I know you can customize the kit and change the quantity to 0 and then add The Rehashpy products to my cart. Can frogs get their vitamin A using herptivite?





Socratic Monologue said:


> Rep Cal does not contain any Vitamin A that is usable by frogs. Rep Cal is not a complete vitamin supplement for frogs.
> 
> Dusting every feeding with Repashy Calcium Plus is an easy, foolproof, proven regimen. Dendrocare is another brand that is more expensive but would work well as a daily dusting product.





Socratic Monologue said:


> So much the worse for Josh's Frogs. Their promotion of that product does not change the fact that it has no retinol (which is Vitamin A that frogs can use), but rather has only beta carotine (which frogs -- and all other carnivores, AFAIK) cannot process to create Vitamin A.
> 
> Herptivite was popular in the 1990s and earlier, when there was a now-debunked scare regarding Vitamin A toxicity. Poke around using the search feature here, and I'm sure Ed has cited literature that establishes this.





Ed said:


> [regarding] supplements which use beta carotene as their sole source of vitamin A. As has been repeated multiple times, beta carotene as a source of vitamin A for anurans is problematic as there is strong evidence they they either cannot convert it or they can only minimally convert it.
> 
> Repashy products contain preformed vitamin A in the form of retinyl palimatate along with a variety of carotenoids besides beta carotene.
> 
> ...


Again: No. Frogs cannot get their vitamin A using Herptivite. 

Below is a link from the manufacturer stating that Herptivite contains no (preformed; retinol) Vitamin A. Reference the quote from Ed above (pro tip: if it about frogs, or anything related to frogs, and Ed said it, it is true, and he can back it up with more scientific literature than you could read in a lifetime).

Rep-Cal Supplements


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## PhylloBro (Sep 21, 2018)

Is there any true benefit then to rotating in Herptivite vs only using Repashy Calcium plus & Vit A? If i get more benefit from Cal Plus i would rather use that daily than wasting a feeding on an inferior supplement.


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## IronHenry (Sep 6, 2018)

I use Repashy Calcium plus but have a slightly different question: I notice that the bulk of what comes out is a grainy material bigger than a powder. While my flies look white and dusted, I always see this granular stuff in the bottom of the cup that gets thrown away. Those pieces are too big to stick to the flies. Is that a problem?


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## Encyclia (Aug 23, 2013)

IronHenry said:


> I use Repashy Calcium plus but have a slightly different question: I notice that the bulk of what comes out is a grainy material bigger than a powder. While my flies look white and dusted, I always see this granular stuff in the bottom of the cup that gets thrown away. Those pieces are too big to stick to the flies. Is that a problem?


That's a good observation, Henry. I get the same results. I guess I just assume that what sticks to the flies is adequate to get the job done. The results are good for me, so I don't think much of it. I may try a mortar and pestel at some point in the future to see if I can get that dust more finely ground. That is one thing I can say about Dendrocare already is that it is extremely finely ground. I have very little wastage with that product. It wouldn't hurt Repashy to grind their product finer.

Mark


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## indrap (Aug 28, 2018)

Encyclia said:


> IronHenry said:
> 
> 
> > I use Repashy Calcium plus but have a slightly different question: I notice that the bulk of what comes out is a grainy material bigger than a powder. While my flies look white and dusted, I always see this granular stuff in the bottom of the cup that gets thrown away. Those pieces are too big to stick to the flies. Is that a problem?
> ...


That's one of my favorite parts of dendrocare. I find that whatever is left over is also still good for sticking onto fruit flies next feeding. I usually keep some amount of superpig in a sealed bag though after I've grinded it down because it doesnt stick otherwise.


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## Ravage (Feb 5, 2016)

I'm a Repashy guy _ I like Allen and I like that he's a family business.
I use Calcium plus on every feeding except when I use:
SuperVit 2X month
Super Pig 1X month
Vitamin A 1X month (for adults)

I think the larger granules are either: 1) a carrier to keep the fine dust fluffy and help deposit it. or 2) a larger particle that sticks to larger prey items fed to larger critters. or both. It seems light brown in color, so I'm going for carrier.
I'll ask him and report back.


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## I'mNew2Frogs! (Jan 23, 2019)

Hopefully this isn't a stupid question but...

You put supplement in container, you dump flies in container, gently shake, swirl around, how do you get the dusted flies into the viv with out dumping all the residual supplement into the viv along with the flies?

Use a strainer I assume?


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## Encyclia (Aug 23, 2013)

I'mNew2Frogs! said:


> Hopefully this isn't a stupid question but...
> 
> You put supplement in container, you dump flies in container, gently shake, swirl around, how do you get the dusted flies into the viv with out dumping all the residual supplement into the viv along with the flies?
> 
> Use a strainer I assume?


Not stupid at all. By tapping the container, the flies kind of slide to the front ahead of the dust. There is also a certain tilt that helps the process. You get good at separating flies from dust after a while. You can then just dump the residual dust in the garbage.

Mark


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## Destroyer551 (Sep 7, 2013)

The residual dust makes a good supplement for isopod cultures; they eat it up.


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## Ravage (Feb 5, 2016)

I have the reply from Allen Repashy,
It's superpig.
"It's likely the components of the superpig that we add to the mix as these powders are large compared to the super fine calcium that we use and they don't stick to fly's as well as they do crickets.

Cheers, Allen"


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Destroyer551 said:


> The residual dust makes a good supplement for isopod cultures; they eat it up.


Please friends, don't do this. Feeding your isopods leftover vitamin powder can kill your frogs. Here's why.



Pumilo said:


> You definitely want to limit any excess vitamin powder. Isopods absolutely love it. The problem comes over time. There is a form of vitamin E called Tocopherols in most supplements. Isopods do not process tocopherols. Instead, it is sequestered in the isopod, accumulating to levels much higher than found in the wild. If your frog eats enough of these, the vitamin E level in the frog can rise higher than normal. If the vitamin E level in the frog gets high enough, it can block the intake of other vitamins, like vitamins A and D. If levels get high enough to block the Vitamin D completely, then calcium can't be processed properly. If the blood calcium level gets low enough, the frog can go into spasms and die.
> This is only one example of how easily vitamins can get out of balance. Other sequestered vitamins may also be blocking other important vitamin utilization.
> 
> Some is going to get in there no matter what you do. Just try to limit it as best you can. Yes, there are clean up crews that will eat it, but first make sure you have done your job in limiting it.


No, I'm not trying to resurrect a dead thread. A link to this thread was just posted over on FaceBook, reviving it to FaceBook readers.


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## Philsuma (Jul 18, 2006)

ANY Calcium = fine to dump in viv. Actually you WANT to dump this in the viv

Repashy Calcium with vitamins = Meh. As long as you are not dumping it wholesale into the viv, I would not worry.

Dendrocare straight vitamin = Same

Carotinoids = Not an issue that I've heard off

Don't wanna step all over you Doug, but there are a ton of new people who are going to lose sleep over some dusting cup loss in their vivs, and we gotta mitigate that.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Agreed, Phil. Small amounts that may spill into your vivarium are not a concern. My comment was directed towards people thinking of purposely feeding extra vitamin supplements, like meal sized quantities, to their isopods on a regular basis. I've seen more than a few suggestions over the years for people to use up their expired Repashy Calcium Plus, by feeding it to their isopods. Once upon a time I thought it might be a good idea, myself. Then came the day one of Ed's talks made me look up the words, "sequestered", and Tocopherols. 
It almost always seems to be Repashy Calcium Plus that is suggested to feed out to isopods. I can see why. Isopods really love the taste of it. They plow through it like a kid in the candy store. Too many people think that means it must be a good thing.
Never in a million years, would I ever think it's a good idea to give a child a whole bottle of Flintstones children's vitamins for a movie treat, yet somehow it eluded me that frogs are just as susceptible as children, to overdosing on vitamins. 
You know I love a good bottle of Repashy...for it's intended purpose.


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## fishingguy12345 (Apr 7, 2019)

Pumilo said:


> Agreed, Phil. Small amounts that may spill into your vivarium are not a concern. My comment was directed towards people thinking of purposely feeding extra vitamin supplements, like meal sized quantities, to their isopods on a regular basis. I've seen more than a few suggestions over the years for people to use up their expired Repashy Calcium Plus, by feeding it to their isopods. Once upon a time I thought it might be a good idea, myself. Then came the day one of Ed's talks made me look up the words, "sequestered", and Tocopherols.
> 
> It almost always seems to be Repashy Calcium Plus that is suggested to feed out to isopods. I can see why. Isopods really love the taste of it. They plow through it like a kid in the candy store. Too many people think that means it must be a good thing.
> 
> ...


So, I actually do occasionally feed my Isopods leftover Repashy calcium plus (what's left in my feeding cup after dusting the flies) BUT (and it's a big but) only to my Isopods who are not going to be used as feeders (I.e. my pet isopods). And by occasionally, I mean once a month or so I'll have powder left and dump it in.


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## Philsuma (Jul 18, 2006)

There is the 'gut load' crowd which is convinced that you can easily and successfully gut load most of our hobby feeders.

This comes at the expense of dusting, which is essential - no other word for it.

for some reason there is an aversion to dusting and it may be that people don't want to 'touch' the flies or that some escape and they are not confident in tapping and dusting.

dunno, honestly.


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## Broseph (Dec 5, 2011)

Philsuma said:


> There is the 'gut load' crowd which is convinced that you can easily and successfully gut load most of our hobby feeders.
> 
> This comes at the expense of dusting, which is essential - no other word for it.
> 
> ...


Have there been studies on the effectiveness of gut loading? I've always had trouble with the idea that a feeder's last meal can have an impact on the nutritional status of the fed. Except for maybe feeding Super Pig to termites. Because they'll actually eat the concentrated supplement and the particle size of Super Pig makes it hard to dust. 

Also, I think dusting makes the flies easier to handle, if anything. The gliders glide less and the climbers climb less. I dust the flies I use for cultures for this reason.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Broseph said:


> Also, I think dusting makes the flies easier to handle, if anything. The gliders glide less and the climbers climb less. I dust the flies I use for cultures for this reason.


Agreed, and there is another great reason to dust the flies you are starting a culture with. 
All cultures have mites. It's simply unavoidable. You may think it's clean, but have you checked it with an illuminated 30x jeweler's loupe? 
Dusting your flies in a particular manner will knock your mite population down to a base level, each and every time you start a culture. It's a beautiful way to keep your cultures mostly mite free. Of course you can do it with obviously mite infested cultures, too, but I practice it as a preventative maintenance thing. Of course this is another of Ed's wisdom nuggets.

Pull flies from cultures of various age. Some from the freshest producing, and some from cultures that have been producing a week or two. This keeps you from accidentally genetically selecting for a fly culture that booms early and heavily, but then has very few 2nd and 3rd generation flies as it simply fizzles out.

Pull 2 or 3 times as many flies as you normally need for starting cultures. Dust them aggressively, with extra vitamin powder. Perhaps twice as much. Swirl them around in there good. You are doing more than simply coating them with dust. The dust, and the flies knocking around in there, are also knocking the vast majority of invisible mites down into the powder. This continues as the flies crawl all over each other. They are trying to get up and out, while the mites get sifted down into the bottom layers of your dusty little 32 oz mosh pit.

Now you make your cultures using only the top third layer of flies.

The final step is go feed the other 2/3 of your flies, to your frogs, so nothing is wasted.

Alternately, you can skip the final step of feeding to the frogs. If you skip feeding to your frogs, you can choose to use this as a way to use up your extra vitamin powder.


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## varanoid (Jan 21, 2011)

Repashy for me.

And I dust my flies every time I start a new culture. I have not had a mite problem ever since I started doing that.


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## RobJersey (Apr 23, 2019)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*

I used rapashy line for a while, but recently switched to ranarium when I was having bicolor clutch issues. The switch is definitely noticeable in production and coloration of all of my frogs.

Edit: by recently I ,wan 6 months ago.


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## fishingguy12345 (Apr 7, 2019)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



RobJersey said:


> I used rapashy line for a while, but recently switched to ranarium when I was having bicolor clutch issues. The switch is definitely noticeable in production and coloration of all of my frogs.
> 
> Edit: by recently I ,wan 6 months ago.


What ranarium supplements do you use? There are quite a few


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## varanoid (Jan 21, 2011)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



fishingguy12345 said:


> What ranarium supplements do you use? There are quite a few


Equally important, what is the regimen?


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



RobJersey said:


> I used rapashy line for a while, but recently switched to ranarium when I was having bicolor clutch issues. The switch is definitely noticeable in production and coloration of all of my frogs.
> 
> Edit: by recently I ,wan 6 months ago.


Yes sir. That's a really heavy statement to just drop off with no details. I have to say I doubt it, but if there is something claimed to be better that Repashy, you got to give the details. What Repashy supplements were you using, and how? I mean, if you were massively diluting your Repashy, by doing some freaky weird program like Josh's Frogs recommends, all bets are off. Weird, complex, vitamin rotation programs generally serve to dilute the quality ingredients with stuff like Herptivite and RepCal, that were never intended to be used with frogs.


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## Kmc (Jul 26, 2019)

I'm uncomfortable with the Ranarium "Bee Pollen" angle.

Yummy marketing to be sure, but I would rather not have bee pollen, untested for pesticide residuals, being a constant to my animals.


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



Pumilo said:


> Weird, complex, vitamin rotation programs generally serve to dilute the quality ingredients with stuff like Herptivite and RepCal, that were never intended to be used with frogs.


One intended benefit of supplement rotation is to minimize the effects of supplement composition irregularities and unknowns.

https://www.dendroboard.com/forum/b...-feeding-auratus-im-confused.html#post2554682

I wish Ed would have provided a citation for the studies that show these irregularities; I looked but couldn't find them.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



Socratic Monologue said:


> One intended benefit of supplement rotation is to minimize the effects of supplement composition irregularities and unknowns.
> 
> https://www.dendroboard.com/forum/b...-feeding-auratus-im-confused.html#post2554682
> 
> I wish Ed would have provided a citation for the studies that show these irregularities; I looked but couldn't find them.


That is a paper you will never get to see. The powers that be, waved their magic wand and vanished it.

Once upon a time somebody had all the available supplements at the time, lab tested to see what was really in them. The results were truly shocking. Some of the ingredients claimed to be in some supplements, were not present in the claimed amounts, or even at all. Other vitamins were present, but elevated to hundreds of times the claimed amount. Waaaay beyond what is recommended. 
Supplement rotation came to be, as an attempt to round out the deficiencies that were found in pretty much everything tested. It was a wise thing to do back then, as all supplements sucked equally, and some were never even intended to be used with frogs. 
Now we have supplements available with much tighter control, like my brand of choice, Repashy.
To continue to rotate lesser quality, inconsistent from batch to batch, supplements, no longer makes sense. You are simply diluting your overall vitamin program. Think about it. Every time you use a supplement that does not have what they claim is in there, you frogs don't receive that supplement on that feeding. How often do you feed? 3 times a week? Well then you may have just removed 33% of vitamin X from their weekly requirements. That's after only rotating one inferior supplement in.

Stepping back to that mysterious paper.
The vitamin manufacturers of the time had to make a choice. One choice was to either start testing their own products, and begin putting the stated ingredients, and bear with me here folks, because this was a unique and difficult concept, putting them actually _inside of the bottle_.
Of course the opted for choice B. As I understand it, a nice, litigious lawyer was hired, payed for by multiple manufacturers. The paper vanished like a whisper in the wind. Now they were free to make whatever cra, er, supplements they wanted to.
I got the story directly from Ed, years ago. I never got to see the paper, but Ed has seen it.
You can make the paper go away, or can you? Here we are, many years later, and people are still talking about that paper. Did the paper even ever exist? Was it real? I believe it wholeheartedly. I absolutely believe that paper, and the story behind it's vanishing, are 100% real.

Let's talk about those overly complex, unnecessarily expensive vitamin rotations people use. Did any of your chosen supplements pay off a sleazy lawyer instead of upping their game? Are you ok with supporting that kind of thing? Vitamin manufacturers actually paying money to keep the quality of vitamins, well, nonexistent. 
I am confident that my chosen vitamin manufacturer had nothing to do with sleazy lawyers or this story.

No, I will not be sharing any names of anybody who may or may not have been involved. Truthfully, no names were supplied to me. 
And the paper? It can't really be real. It's just a silly story, right? 
Or is it?


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Kmc said:


> I'm uncomfortable with the Ranarium "Bee Pollen" angle.
> 
> Yummy marketing to be sure, but I would rather not have bee pollen, untested for pesticide residuals, being a constant to my animals.


One of my earlier threads was sharing a tadpole food I used to make. It was fairly complex, and it included bee pollen. Ed debunked my recipe pretty quickly. Pesticide contaminated bee pollen was one of his concerns. It made perfect sense to me.
Kmc, I too, looked up Ranarium, and was equally concerned with the bee pollen.


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



Pumilo said:


> Let's talk about those overly complex, unnecessarily expensive vitamin rotations people use. Did any of your chosen supplements pay off a sleazy lawyer instead of upping their game? Are you ok with supporting that kind of thing? Vitamin manufacturers actually paying money to keep the quality of vitamins, well, nonexistent.


I guess I'm thinking of people who might alternate, say, Dendrocare and Repashy Ca+. This is a pretty common practice. Those two supplements have slightly different vitamin profiles, and since there isn't any hard data (that I know of; someone could certainly cite a journal article to show that there is data) on how much of certain vitamins/minerals are needed for species X eating insect prey A, B, and C, it seems prudent to provide a slightly larger range of supplementation. Also, Repashy doesn't even provide analysis of, for example, iron content, so a person might want to use Ca+ to get the carotenoids but use Dendrocare to make sure iron is covered, at least to some extent.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

*Re: Which brand supplemen*



Socratic Monologue said:


> I guess I'm thinking of people who might alternate, say, Dendrocare and Repashy Ca+. This is a pretty common practice. Those two supplements have slightly different vitamin profiles, and since there isn't any hard data (that I know of; someone could certainly cite a journal article to show that there is data) on how much of certain vitamins/minerals are needed for species X eating insect prey A, B, and C, it seems prudent to provide a slightly larger range of supplementation. Also, Repashy doesn't even provide analysis of, for example, iron content, so a person might want to use Ca+ to get the carotenoids but use Dendrocare to make sure iron is covered, at least to some extent.


I don't use Dendrocare, myself, but I don't have any problems with Dendrocare. It is a quality supplement, and rotating that in should be fine. Rotating in some other brands, I feel may be doing more harm than good.


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