Phrynosoma platyrhinos

What Do Horned Lizards Eat?

~ BackwaterReptiles

What do Horned lizards eat? That’s a question many well-intentioned reptile hobbyists ask when their pet Horned lizard won’t eat various common feeder insects. As is usually the case, it’s important to educate yourself before you purchase one of these fascinating lizards as a pet. When properly set up, they can make long-lived pet lizards.

“Horned toads,” as they are often called due to their squatty appearance, are members of the Phrynosoma family and are spread across North and Central America. There are thirteen recognized species in all, with most occurring within the United States.

what do horned lizards eat?
Horned lizards prefer to eat ants. They’re a wonderful species but need to be fed correctly for long-term success.

What do Horned Lizards Eat?

The Problem: It’s pretty simple. Generally speaking, Horned lizards eat ants in the wild. Harvester ants are often preferred (be careful, they bite!), but they will consume common black ants as well (not the tiny red ones). Collecting enough ants can be very difficult, although you can attract them with just about any over-ripe fruit. But, there’s a trick that can make things much simpler…

The Solution: The easiest method is to switch them over to appropriately-sized crickets, which most of them will readily do. There’s one very important catch–Horned lizards require formic acid in their diet. They get this from ants in the wild, so it will need to be replaced if you feed them crickets instead. How can this be done? Simple.

Fortunately, we have a supplement available that’s specifically for Horned lizards. It’s a powder that you simply dust feeder insects with, and immediately offer them to your Horned lizard. Presto! You’ve now replaced the formic acid your pet lizard previously derived from consuming ants. You can purchase this product on our Horned lizard page using the drop-down menu on our horned lizard page.

formic acid horned lizard
Formic acid is required in all Horned lizard diets.

Using the above care tips, your pet Horned lizard can enjoy a long lifespan on a formic acid supplemented diet of crickets, mealworms, beetles, and grasshoppers.

We hope our “What do Horned lizards eat?” blog article has helped explain this unique reptile’s specialized diet in a way that is both applicable and relevant to your situation. If you have any questions, just let us know. If you’re ready to keep your own pet Horned lizard, we offer them for sale on our reptile website.

Desert Horned Lizard Facts

~ BackwaterReptiles

Here are a few facts about Desert Horned lizards–probably the most unique-looking lizards in the country. The Desert Horned Lizard (Phrynosoma platyrhinos) is also known as the Horny Toad lizard or the Short-horned lizard and is native to desert terrains. These interesting-looking lizards are short, round, flat, and as their name suggests, horned. They have an array of spikey scales on their bellies and heads which make them appear quite fierce, although as pets they are pretty laid-back.

horned lizard facts
Horned lizards are one of the most unique-looking reptiles in the United States. Their primary diet is ants, but they will accept other food items.

Horned lizards can be tough to keep in captivity due to the fact that their main diet in the wild consists of ants, which are not necessarily easy to come by in the pet food trade. Horned lizards can and will eat other normal feeder insects such as crickets, but they need ants in their diet in order to thrive, so we recommend making sure you can acquire ants or live near an ant hill before you commit to a horned lizard as a pet.

The primary reason ants are an important part of their diet is because ants contain formic acid. Fortunately, there is a product produced by Repashy called Formic-Cal Plus, which is a supplement powder you can dust feeder insects with (such as crickets), so that the horned lizards are getting proper amounts of formic acid.

Certain horned lizards, such as the Phrynosoma asio (Giant Mexican Horned lizard) can be fed crickets and other insects exclusively.

horned toad facts
Horned lizards are also known as “horned toads.”

The most bizarre thing about these amazing lizards is their primary defense mechanism against predators. Not only can they puff themselves up and make themselves hard to swallow, but they can squirt blood out of the corners of their eyes with fairly decent accuracy! It’s assumed that they aim for predators’ eyes and only use this tactic as a last resort.

horned lizard squirting blood
This is how the Horned Lizard shoots blood from its eyes. Photo from www.discovery.com.

These flat little lizards are excellent burrowers and camouflagers. They like to remain very still and blend in with their surroundings or submerge themselves in desert sand to hide out from potential threats. In captivity, this means you should provide them with a substrate that accommodates their burrowing, such as a compacted sand and soil mix, as well as provide plenty of hide spaces. Remember, substrate that is too dry will not properly hold a burrow.

horned lizard phyrnosoma

Backwater Reptiles regularly offers Horned Lizards for sale. They are not necessarily the best pet reptiles for beginners due to their somewhat specialized diet, but experienced herp hobbyists should have no trouble keeping these squat little critters happy.