Can bearded dragons eat romaine lettuce? Yes, bearded dragons can eat romaine lettuce. Out of all the lettuce varieties, romaine lettuce is the healthiest to feed your beardie. However, it still has a lot of water content, which can harm their health. To prevent any health issues, give romaine lettuce to your beardie in small amounts, once a month.
In this post, we’ll cover everything from the best way to feed romaine lettuce to how often to feed bearded dragons.
Is It Safe For Bearded Dragons To Eat Romaine Lettuce?
Romaine lettuce is safe for bearded dragons to eat since it doesn’t contain any toxins.
However, what can make the lettuce unsafe for them is how much and how often they are fed. This variety of lettuce contains too much water content and can cause bowel blockages, digestion issues, and other health problems.
Therefore, to ensure romaine lettuce doesn’t cause any health issues for your beardie, give them a small amount, once or twice per month.
Is It Healthy For Bearded Dragons To Eat Romaine Lettuce?
Romaine is a leafy green that is very high in calcium and vitamin A. It also contains a wide range of other nutrients that are essential for the health of your Bearded Dragon, such as iron and potassium.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 8 calories |
| Carbohydrates | 1.5 g |
| Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 0.6 g |
| Total fat | 0.1 g |
Below are some of the health benefits of feeding romaine lettuce to your bearded dragon:
Promote Bone Health
Romaine lettuce has a rich supply of minerals, which include copper, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, and iron. All of the minerals can help increase bone density.
This variety of lettuce also has a good amount of vitamin K, which can optimize bone growth and prevent bone loss.
Boost Immune System
Romaine lettuce is a good source of vitamin C. This vitamin is known for its impact on the immune system. When bearded dragons eat food rich in vitamin C, it will give their immune system a boost.
A healthy immune system will help keep your beardie from becoming ill.
Prevent Illness and Diseases
Romaine lettuce is a good source of antioxidants, which is essential for keeping your bearded dragon healthy. Antioxidant are compound that prevents free radicals from causing damages to the cells in the body.
If there are too many free radicals in the body, your beard will be prone to illness and develop diseases.
Can Baby Bearded Dragons Eat Romaine Lettuce?
At this age, baby bearded dragons require a good amount of calcium and protein to support their fast growth. For that reason, 70-80% of their diet should consist of live foods such as crickets, beetles, and worms. The rest of their diet should come from vegetables and fruits.
Therefore, baby dragons can eat romaine lettuce, but only on occasion. While romaine lettuce has a good amount of nutrition, it has too much water that can cause digestive issues.
There are other vegetables that are much better for baby beardie than romaine lettuce. This includes bok choy, bell peppers, mustard greens, and yellow squash.
How To Prepare Romaine Lettuce For Bearded Dragons
Romaine lettuce should be prepared before giving any to your bearded dragons. Below are some helpful tips to prepare and feed them the lettuce.
Go Organic – If you’ve bought romaine lettuce from the grocery stores, there’s a good chance that it has pesticides. Most farms use pesticides and other chemicals to help the lettuce grow and prevent damages from pests. The chemicals used are toxic and can harm the beardie.
For that reason, it’s best to buy only organically grown romaine lettuce. If you can’t, make sure to wash the lettuce thoroughly to remove the chemicals from them.
Wash Thoroughly – Whether you’ve bought romaine lettuce from the store or picked them from your own garden, it’s very important that you wash them, even if it looks clean. Some pests could be too small to see and they could harm your beardie when they eat it.
Also, washing them first help remove some of the pesticides from the lettuce.
Cut Them Up – Romaine lettuce are too large and could cause your beardie to choke on them. It’s best to cut the lettuce into small pieces.
Serve Them – Once they are all cut, you have two options to feeding the romaine lettuce to them. You can feed just the lettuce to them by placing the pieces in their bowl.
Another option is to mix the lettuce with other vegetables and fruits. This is a good way to give your beardie a boost in nutrition.
If you have a beardie that doesn’t like to eat lettuce, you can mix it with some fruits such as strawberries, blueberries, or bananas. The sweet taste of the fruit will entice them to eat the lettuce.
How Often Can Bearded Dragons Eat Romaine Lettuce?
When it comes to feeding your bearded dragon, many owners make the mistake of feeding them romaine lettuce too often or not often enough.
Due to their high amount of water content, it’s best to feed romaine lettuce to your beardie in moderation. This means a small piece of the leafy greens once a week.
Other Leafy Greens That Bearded Dragons Can Eat
Collard Greens
Collard greens are nutritious and tasty. They contain vitamins A, C, K, B6, E, and folate. They also offer a lot of dietary fiber. Before feeding it to your bearded dragon, you must ensure that they are fresh. I recommend making sure the leaves do not have any holes in them or yellowing.
Radish Greens
Radish greens, like other leafy green vegetables, are packed with nutrients that can benefit bearded dragons. The leaves of radishes also contain calcium and iron, two key components in the diet of bearded dragons. However, make sure to not feed too many radish greens at once; only provide your pet with a moderate amount (about 10% of his total diet) of this vegetable on a daily basis.
Mustard Greens
There are many varieties of mustard greens. Mustard greens are extremely nutritious, and bearded dragons love the taste! The vitamin C content in mustard greens is much higher than in other vegetables. You can feed your pet with mustard greens as a staple food for your beardie.
Conclusion
At this point, you should have a good understanding of whether romaine lettuce is good or bad for bearded dragons. Remember to only feed it occasionally as part of a healthy diet and you shouldn’t run into any problems.
