Care: Diet

Here is the very short of it:
(There are lengthy explanations on this page, but here is the very basics of what we feed to have healthy, well furred potatoes.)

For treats you can use small amounts of fruits and veggies, eggs, or crested gecko diets. You can feed the occasional whole vertebrate, such as f/t pinkies/quail/feeder lizards, but feeding vertebrates is frequently overdone in captivity. STO's in the wild eat a very small amount of plant matter and many don't eat vertebrates.

I've included longer explanations below. Many recommendations about diet going around about STOs are pretty bad. I aim to be as complete in my reasoning as possible so you can make informed decisions.

Key points incase you skim:
STOs aren't omnivores
STOs are insectivores
Insects are easier to digest than other foods
Insects have different nutrition than carnivore kibbles
Still need to feed kibble, but dust with multivitamins and add insects
Much of this page relies on a diet study looking at their poop. Researchers collected fecal samples several times a year from 70 opossums snd recorded what each ate.
From that study:
They mainly ate insects (a surprising amount of the group with bees/termites/ants)
Very few ate any plant matter
Hardly any ate vertebrates, none of which were rodents.
That was just one study, we are still learning, but we can be confident they eat mainly bugs and some fruits. Veggies and too many fruits will "water down the nutrients". Meat is harder to digest than bugs and kibble is already mostly meat (or should be). Extra meat is unnecessary and best as just treats. I'll update as I learn.

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The foundation: kibble
Currently we recommend/use:
Instinct original kitten,
and Farmina N&D Prime Chicken & Pomegranate Recipe Kitten Dry Food, or similar
(Most likely there are many others that are also good. I'll add to this as they show up)

https://www.chewy.com/squarepet-grain-free-turkey-chicken/dp/323354

https://www.chewy.com/instinct-ultimate-protein-grain-free/dp/146296

https://www.chewy.com/instinct-raw-boost-mixers-chicken/dp/117334

I'd recommend keeping kibble in the majority. We do somewhere around 80%, but its not a recipe.

(optional) More info:
Insects all have different nutrition and STOs eat a wide variety. We cant keep STOs healthy on the limited insect species we have available (though if you have termites you may have a leg up). There are clear differences between insects and the meats found in kibbles (not bad, just different-- remember STOs are specialized and eat mainly insects), but kibbles are regulated to meet balanced nutrition requirements though some do a much better job than others. A high quality kibble is a good balanced foundation, meeting most of their needs. You can then add to it by supplementing foods and vitamins that make up some of the nutritional differences between kibble and insects.

We aim for quality of protein and fat, not a certain percentage. You'll hear that increasing protein will help reduce balding. Some cases it does because kibbles with higher protein also have more nutrition (given it doesn't come from peas/lentils). Too much protein can also be harmful in some species such a s hedgehogs. With the foods we recommend, the protein and fat amounts end up being similar to insects, though some of the types of fats are different. That gives me a little confidence that the high protein wont effect them the same as hedgehogs, but I am always on the watch for kidney problems or the like with these kibbles.

Figuring out relative kibble quality is purposely misleading. I'll add a run through of what I look for (warning: some recreational math) in tips, but until then feel free to ask.
Our non-STO world is ferrets so our kibbles and preferences are skewed and limited. There are so few kibbles that are good for ferrets. There are probably quite a few more that are okay for STOs, but since the ones for ferrets (not made for ferrets-- ones we found for our ferrets) are so high quality, we haven't expanded much.

We currently dont use the ferrets wysong ds. I think it might have given them stomach problems. Its hard on ferret tummies (needs mixed with other kibbles) and I think its harder on the STOs. Also, despite my theme of highjacking foods suggested for ferrets, don't give STOs Marshall's ferret food. Don't give ferrets Marshall's food or toys. The whole company needs to jump of a cliff and... go to another dimension where we never have to see them again. Also the toilet paper there is sand paper.



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Other/non-essentials
Vegetables: we don't feed
Most of the animals in the study didn't eat them-- we opt not to feed them vegetables. They can be hard to digest, many potatoes (pun?) dont like them so they arnt good bribes, and, again, they dilute the nutrition they need. That said, I may have slipped a bit or two of cooked sweet potato to them over the years....

Cooked meat*=treats
Some cooked, unseasoned meats are fine, but should be treated like treats. Kibble is made with whole chickens (or another vertebrate) -- some muscle meat (not nutritionally complete) isn't going to benefit them. They just like it and its a safe treat.

Raw*: we don't feed
I worry about parasites. Yes, they don't have little opossum cooking pits in the wild, but they don't need to live long in the wild either. Parasites are hard on an animal and can be found in any raw meat (like those in the grocery store-- cook your meat). Seafood in particular is a parasite nightmare. There are also a lot of bacteria and germs in raw meat.  Nutrition wise its the same for them as cooked, but uncooked meat is harder to digest. And again, kibble has whole prey meat.

Whole prey*: we opt not to
Like I see often, we once fed mice and pinkies.  We've stopped. Even frozen can carry parasites. I do my own parasite checks, but treating so many just isnt worth it for us. Note too, STOs don't eat many vertebrates in the wild. Only a total of 10 fecal samples contained evidence of vertebrates. When they did it vertebrates, they ate reptiles, birds, and eggs. No mammals, but there was one unidentified vertebrate. Rodents wont hurt them, but if you 'd like to feed whole prey you can also try out some baby quail and even some feeder lizards (can get packs of frozen).

*Keep in mind, kibble is made from vertebrate meat already. Feeding meat is just adding more of the same. Its more valuable to add insects. And good kibble is made using whole animals and/or has nutrition in the same proportions as a whole animal. 

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Insects
We feed a wide variety. We have our own mealworm, wax worms, dubia roaches, and isopod colonies. We have to use freeze dried versions of solider flies and crickets. If its an insect commonly found for reptiles you can give it to STOs.

This makes up the bulk of the remaining ~20% of what we feed on average.


Insects we feed
Mealworms/beetles
Easy, fast producing, healthy part of a varied diet. You can feed the beetles too. They have different nutrition and feeding them avoids waste. so are a fantastic way to add variety.

isopods
Most people don't consider rolly-pollys (tell me what you call them and I'll take $5 off a baby), but they are a good fun food source, I recommend Porcellio laevis. or Porcellionides pruinosus, but we use more ornamental species too for fun. We get them from Josh's Frogs.

Dubia cockroaches
There are other species, but we like Dubia roached. They are unlikely to escape and even less likely to breed if they do. This is important as one of us here doesn't love cockroaches --its not me. I consider them pets too. Roaches are very good for STOs, but kind of slow producing. Be kind to the roaches-- they will be our post-apocalyptic overlords.

wax worms
Slow producing, a little high in fat, but healthy in a varied insect diet. One of our ferrets eats them too. Also, I like moths.

I mix in kibble:

Dried soldier fly larve
We feed the dried because it would be infeasible to breed them in a closet, but one of the best insects to feed.

Dried crickets:
Fed in small amounts as they could potentially lead to calcium problems (more below). We feed dried because, though I'm ashamed to admit it, I really friggin hate crickets. They are the only animal I dislike almost as much as I dislike plants. I'd sooner keep free-range mosquitos. I have no idea why...

One of my girls loves canned grass hoppers

(optional) More info:
* careful with crickets. Their Ca:P ratio is horrid. As multi-vitamins have a balanced Ca:P ratio, I’m not
In the study I reference above, every fecal sample, in every season contained lots of arthropods. Even though we recommend keeping kibble as the majority, insects are still very important. We make it about 20% of the diet, but I would probably feed a bit more (maybe ~30%) if I wasn't so violently allergic.

Freeze dried gets a bad reputation. The only concern  I've found reasonable is fear of impaction eating a whole bunch at once or almost exclusively freeze dried bugs. Otherwise they are a fantastic way of getting chitin and other bug benefits. I have ways to help "convince" them to eat freeze dried (most of mine just did anyway). The easiest ways so far: mixing them in kibble or coating them with a treat like crested gecko food (works for new kibbles too). I've also ground them up before doing either option. Don't give up on a picky spud! It can take time to get them used to foods. Never feels as long in hindsight.

I'll have more soon on various, important nutritional differences to consider with insects. For now I will say, careful with crickets. The amount of calcium to phosphorous in a food is important for actually using the calcium. Its called the calcium phosphorous ratio (Ca:P).  In ratios the units don't matter, just two units worth of calcium per one unit of phospherous 2:1. Crickets are in the ball park of 1:12. Too much food with a bad Ca:P ratio could lead to calcium deficiency. Vitamins help, but wont fix it. They are balanced too-- already 2:1 so they cant increase the crickets' ratio. Crickets are great, but in moderation. Same goes for you if you eat crickets. I'd go into anaphylaxis, but I hear they're good.

*Even if you really don't like them, never forget they contribute to the health of your animals. We keep in mind their value to the opossums and treat them with respect, putting effort into what keeps them comfortable-- before they are ritualistically sacrificed to the marsupial overlords.

Vitamins
We use repti-cal vitamins and just dust a little on the kibble or bugs. I imagine similar brands will work, just note-- he multivitamins are more important than the calcium in it.

Just a sprinkle on kibble or bugs.

(optional) More info
Without a roof a house is... a small maze? Without vitamins there is still the risk of that gap between kibble and their wild insect diet  becoming a problem over time. I cant imagine there is a  problematic difference between brands. We use repti-cal Multi-vitamins (cant be just calcium). I'm looking for things like iron and zinc which are above the amount found in meats people are more willing to eat (eat some bugs, let me know how they are).

https://www.amazon.com/HERPTIVITE-Multivitamin-reptiles-amphibians-Bottle/dp/B00076HT3S

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Fruit
We give fruit in small amounts, we avoid acidic fruits. They make great bribes.

Until recently we didn't feed much if at all. Many are acidic (bad for teeth) and they "water down" the nutrients they get from the kibble, insects, and vitamins. In the diet study I've been referencing many didn't give indication they ate any, but their is another old-ish study suggesting some fruit is beneficial and in another study they were found to be especially appealing treats. We use them as bribes for socializing or convincing them to try new foods. Usually a little crested gecko diet or applesauce on a new food helps. We try to go for less acidic fruits to protect their teeth: pear, apple and melon seem to be a go. Citric fruits and berries are much more acidic and we rarely feed them. It is hilarious to watch them eat a blueberry now and again, but blueberries will melt your teeth (hey don't have toothbrushes). We just keep it moderate.

*acidic fruits hurt your teeth too. A Ph scale is a way to measure how acidic things are. It ranges 7 to 14 (Battery acid is a 0 and ammonia is a 14) 7 is neutral: above is "basic", below is "acidic". Your teeth like neutral or a bit basic (~7-8). In a sense they start melting at 5.5 and below. Many foods including: sugar, some fruits, and carinated beverages are very low-- can be near cleaning vinegar low, Pepsi is 2.5. Not only is that well below 5.5-- the scale is exponential meaning 4 is much more acidic and 3 is much MUCH or acidic. Swishing water in your mouth or brushing 20min after having these really helps. Opossums can't brush and I'm not brave enough to do it for them so we just avoid acidic fruits.

Cautions
We ask, beseech, plead, that you don’t do a ‘custom’ diet
What is folate? Why do you need it? Where do you get it?
Folate is a B vitamin. Deficiency causes anemia and can lead to certain cancers, heart disease, and severe birth defects. Grain products have to be enriched with folate because humans cant even get their own diets right. Specialist, like insectivores, are less forgiving than us omnivores. If you can't tell me the approximate Ca:P ratio, iron ppm, quantity and types of fat in the foods etc AND relate those to roughly the avg composition of the arthropods they eat in the wild then, please, for the love of the great, dooking weasel in the sky, don't make up your own diets from scratch without guidance. Wonderful, creative, compassionate owners that try it, but so many  of those diets look like mini versions of people food.... which, again, we don't always get right.

*Unbalanced meats (various amounts of muscle, organ, bone etc without consideration as to the relative proportions of each found in whole prey) can be dangerous if a notable portion of the diet. Its pitfall people fall into trying to feed ferrets raw without looking into it. Too much of some organs can make them sick, too much muscle meat can essentially starve them. (Nothing to worry about when just fed as  treats)

Never feed anything that could bite back
I don't care if one thinks its natural and "enriching". Its not. No STO is going to trap themselves in a confined space with a scared mouse. They are smart enough to know not to risk wasted effort (spend energy) and injury (infection and death) for something that's not even part of their diet. They typically instinctively attack if some masochistic owner chucks a rodent their way (and they win a surprising amount of time given they have the bite force of a gnat), but STOs would rather just treat themselves to some defenseless babies and be on their way. If someone is really eager for the "natural, enriching" experience, I'm happy to lock them in a room with a scared boar the next time they want bacon.

*This does suggest feeding things like live pinkies or baby quails is safe. Though I know it bothers a lot of people, it is as safe as raw or frozen is. I have no business in the ethics of it, only its impact on STOs. I don't feed any vertebrates.