Are butterflies with large wings safe?

Those butterflies you are feeding your chameleon are swallowtails and most swallowtails are toxic and bitter tasting.
 
Screw that. I'm only giving him moths.

Do you know which types of butterflies I can feed him? for treats only, once a week.
 
ummm I'm pretty sure painted ladies are ok, usually it's the dull colored butterflies that aren't as pretty or brightly colored that aren't toxic.
 
whats the point if feeding it butterflies, can you not afford its food? I would leave the butterflies alone they help pollinate and look pretty.
 
He likes things that fly. Somehow a moth was in his cage and he was mesmerized and was hunting it. I thought it would have been a treat. So far I've only given him 2 butterflies and he loved it. I probably shouldn't they are pretty but they die pretty quick. For some reason my guy here loves to chase things that fly.
 
The point of feeding butterflies (non-toxic butterflies) is to give a change in diet. Chameleons aren't meant to only eat three different kinds of feeders, in the wild they eat all sorts of things. I bet they eat probably at least 5 different things daily. Sadly we do not replicate store bought food as well as wild food so sometimes wild caught food is a good option. Plus wild caught food tends to have a good gut load on it compared to the store bought options if you haven't made sure your gut load is the best. However if you are feeding wild caught just make sure to get regular fecals done in case of parasites.

It's our job as keepers of these amazing creatures to make them as "happy" as possible. If we have the ability to we should give them the best we can. It's not fair to keep them just to say you have one.
 
Where do you get 5 to 6 different bugs? mine doesn't like superworms because they whip it's tail on my Veiled face-- and wax worms he won't even tough. He loves crickets-- i haven't tried the roach yet.
 
I was wondering if anything thinks this is a good deal

last time I got it -- they were all alive, but I couldn't keep them alive for too long-- now I have proper housing for them, clear container w/lid, egg crates, heat pad, water, crystals, chow
 
idk man, mine just likes crickets and sometimes i'll give him wild caught stuff. i gave him wild caught flies but it grossed me out-- he loved it but i didn't think it was good.
 
Blue bottle Flies are really cheap so I would skip the wild flies. They don't eat well in the wild. Garbage,dead things,feces. Try Mantisplace.com you keep them in the fridge and just hatch out chat you need. I do wild dragonflies sometimes. My guy loves those. Just be sure you hare hunting for wild bugs where there are no pesticides. You get fecals done by calling a reptile vet. Find out if the do fecals on certain days. Then when he goes scoop it up in a sandwich Baggie and bring it in. They will test it for parasites. Just use the baggie if you use a paper towel it soaks up to much poo. Bring it in fresh within a few hours and store in the fridge if you are not heading to the vet immediately. If you just have one chameleon buying 1000 crickets rarely seems worth it. Every time I did it most of them died before I could feed them off.
 
I got 2- one is 6 - 7 weeks old and my veiled is 5 months now. the small guy needs small crickets and the big guy needs larger crickets. it's wayy cheaper than petco/petsmart.
 
unixmiah said:
I was wondering if anything thinks this is a good deal

last time I got it -- they were all alive, but I couldn't keep them alive for too long-- now I have proper housing for them, clear container w/lid, egg crates, heat pad, water, crystals, chow
Click to expand...

A thousand crickets for one chameleon will give you large die-off, and the smell is…not good.

try 250 first and see how it goes.

CHEERS!

Nick:D
 
ALL my chams live by one rule: IF IT FLIES, IT DIES! They love anything and everything that flies. (Moths, Bees, Butterflies, Flies, Canadian Geese :eek:)
 
I wouldn't feed wax worms to a cham unless it was severely underweight or if it was just a treat for maybe once a month. My boy Ryker gets them more regularly than he should but his metabolism is insane and he has a hard time keeping weight on him even if though he's eating almost every day, if not every day it's a lot every other day. He eats everything too. His fecals are clean, he's just really active and has always been a heavy and healthy eater. It's somewhat hard to keep him in a weight range that I like without feeding him high calorie feeders because he won't eat enough of the lower calorie that it will cause him to keep the weight.

So he gets a couple wax worms a week. Along with some butterworms whenever I have them because he looks waaay to thin for my liking right now. I was out of town for a week and a half, the person who was watching him wasn't feeding him the right amount and though he still has fat stores and muscle on him... like you can't see his ribs at all, his casque has no plumpness at all. Worries me. So I am feeding the wax worms more often and feeding him more roaches than I would normally because right now he's taking them.

I don't like super worms because of the very fact that they bite, if I feed them at all I crush their mandibles. Silkworms, butterworms (if you have a cham whose not allergic), and hornworms are my preferred worm feeders. Roaches (dubia and Giant Green Banana) are my favorite hard shell feeders, with crickets about two times a week. Add some wild caught grasshoppers that I breed when it's summer and then the babies next year to feed off, though I have yet to actually get a steady colony going. Stick insects, and maybe some leaf insects when I get some babies from colony going if Ryker will eat them. I have also done preying mantids but I don't think I will again... too much work. I do Black Soldier Fly larvae and the flies themselves which Ryker loves as a snack.
 
I feed wax worms (I get 50 at petsmart for a couple bucks), crix (reptile shops have em for 5 cents or so a piece while petsmart has them for 13 cents each), mealworms (reptile store, 100 for six bucks or so), dubia roaches (I can get them as cheap as 20 cents a piece and they are medium too), superworms (just crush the head and they wont whip :D), ect!!!!!! Other good options are calci/phoenix worms, hornworms, rusty reds, silkworms, blah blah blah
 
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