The powdered staple runs the week
A crested gecko's week is built on its complete powdered diet, mixed fresh with water to a smoothie consistency and set out in a small dish or ledge cup on most evenings. Replace it rather than topping it up: diet left for a second night dries at the edges and sours, and a fresh dish each time means the lick marks you find in the morning honestly report how much the gecko ate. Some adults hold their condition well on fresh diet every other evening, but offering most nights and removing the leftovers keeps the pattern simple and the gecko's weight easier to read. Position the dish up on a ledge or magnetic platform rather than on the floor: crested geckos feed above ground by instinct, and a dish at branch height is found faster and fouled less by substrate.
Insect nights for protein and hunting
Two or three evenings a week, add live insects to the menu — small crickets, little roach nymphs, or black soldier fly larvae, sized to the gecko and lightly dusted with calcium. Offer them in the early evening so the gecko can hunt them through its active hours, and keep the number modest enough that none are still loose in the vivarium days later. Growing juveniles sit at the frequent end of the insect rhythm, and a gecko that hunts keenly but picks at its dish is often telling you the balance has tipped too far toward insects. Tong-feed or release insects near the gecko rather than scattering them widely — a shy feeder hunts better when the prey crosses its path, and you can count what was actually eaten.
Amounts by age, and reading the dish
A hatchling or young juvenile should have fresh diet available every evening, because growth is fuelled nightly, while a settled adult's intake steadies and its body condition becomes the guide. Judge amounts by the evidence: consistent lick marks and a stable weight mean the week is pitched right; untouched dishes several nights running mean checking temperatures, the diet's freshness, and the gecko's overall condition before changing the menu. Weighing on the same morning each week turns guesswork into a trend you can act on. Note the flavour, too — many geckos favour one powdered diet flavour over another, and rotating accepted flavours keeps a picky eater interested across the month.
Fruit stays a treat, freshness stays a rule
Mashed ripe fruit — a little banana or papaya — can appear occasionally as a treat mixed into the diet or offered on its own, but it should never displace the complete diet across the week, because fruit alone cannot carry the gecko's nutrition. The standing rules are freshness ones: mix small batches, throw out anything that has sat out overnight, rinse the dish between servings, and keep a shallow water dish and a nightly misting alongside every feed so hydration keeps pace with eating.
A routine with staple nights and insect nights only stays a routine when it is written down where the whole household can follow it. KinsLe's Care Teams hold the crested gecko's weekly feeding plan as shared duties, so the rhythm survives whoever does the evening round.