cham eating mud !!!

Bloo

Bloo

New Member
my cham has started eating mud !!!! is this ok. i cant stop her doing it.... what does it mean???? cheers nic
 
Bloo said:
my cham has started eating mud !!!! is this ok. i cant stop her doing it.... what does it mean???? cheers nic
Click to expand...

use magnifying glass and see if the soil has little bugs running around.
your cham probably hunting fungus gnats..
 
I would be very careful if I was you. I lost a Cham this way, she would eat the mud but one day she got deeper and uncovered a fertalizer pellet. It was like a cyanide pill. It was my stupid mistake for not changing the soil completely but still make sure your soil is clean and poison free. Other than that I would guess it is pretty normal for chams.
 
Chances are it has nothing to do with gnats or any other insect.
Soil is, for whatever reason, part of their diet.
Make sure it is clean, sifted, fertilizer and pesticide free.
One question though....my definition of mud is very wet soil...why is your cham exposed to "mud" in the first place???

-Brad
 
Scooter ate the plant dirt when we first got him, Dont knwo why but he stopped and hes (other than his parisite not from the mud) healthy. The mud never gave him problems. You may wana watch him and make sure he doesnt eat a huge piece of dirt that can impact him.
 
Brad Ramsey said:
Chances are it has nothing to do with gnats or any other insect.
Soil is, for whatever reason, part of their diet.
Make sure it is clean, sifted, fertilizer and pesticide free.
One question though....my definition of mud is very wet soil...why is your cham exposed to "mud" in the first place???

-Brad
Click to expand...

soil is part of their diet? what species of chameleon are we talking about here, i have never heard of chameleons (veileds anyways) eating soil. thats really interesting.
What purpose does it serve?
i have never seen mine eat anything other than his feeders and his plants
 
in my case, it turned out to be hunting for fungus gnat's larvae.
As soon as I repot the plants and clean he ficus root..
He's no longer go down to the bottom to hunt.
 
Lindsey said..."soil is part of their diet? what species of chameleon are we talking about here, i have never heard of chameleons (veileds anyways) eating soil. thats really interesting"...veileds are the most common one that do it. Panther chameleons have been known to chew the bark off branches in their cages.

Lindsey said..."What purpose does it serve?"...its possible that they do it because they are missing something in their diet and eating soil may make up for it....or it could be for a number of other reasons. A great many creatures eat various soils for various reasons....including humans...its called geophagy.

Here's some information about it...
http://geography.about.com/cs/cultur...a/geophagy.htm
http://www.duke.edu/~djb4/Colpa to... figures.htm
Not only do creatures eat things that can control parasites, satisfying other needs can lead to getting parasites..
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...&dopt=Citation
Geophagy also serves another purpose for some...protection against plant toxins...
http://www.uic.edu/classes/osci/osci...DirtasFood.htm
Eating leaves....and other unusual (to us, anyway) remedies...
http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Publicatio...ldremedies.cfm
http://www.ars-grin.gov/duke/syllabus/module8.htm

Lindsey said..."i have never seen mine eat anything other than his feeders and his plants"...some of my veiled females eat a lot of leaves off their plants and the sand in the egglaying containers too.
 
Try putting clean large smooth stone river rocks on top of your soil to deter your cham from eating dirt. Works for me and adds decoration to the environment! hope that helps.
 
ReefMedic1 said:
Try putting clean large smooth stone river rocks on top of your soil to deter your cham from eating dirt. Works for me and adds decoration to the environment! hope that helps.
Click to expand...

I do this... but I have never seen my chams try to eat soil... I put the rocks there to keep them from eating the fertilized soil. I am not sure how many crickets I lose in the rocks... I don't think it is very many because my chams eat when they see the crickets dropped in.

Kinyonga,

only a couple of links seem to be working in your list of references.
 
Phatturk said:
I would be very careful if I was you. I lost a Cham this way, she would eat the mud but one day she got deeper and uncovered a fertalizer pellet. It was like a cyanide pill. It was my stupid mistake for not changing the soil completely but still make sure your soil is clean and poison free. Other than that I would guess it is pretty normal for chams.
Click to expand...

Well I'm not sure if we are talking about the same fertalizer pellets but on Thanksgiving I had Victoria with me at a friends that has Pothos all over her house vine linked from one to another. Well Victoria got one of those pellets and holy cow did I freak. First the white BB sized pellets are nothing like cyanide thank God. Cyanide for one is a very quick death. The multiplying of oxygen thru the blood stream to if given enough the heart would explode. However blood being pushed thru your skin out your nose, ears, eyes, under your nails, mouth and other orffices. This was not the effect and instantlly I offered Victoria 6 large meal worms to put in as much fat as I had on me to offer to help absorbe any chemicals and help pass this pellet.

Good news she is okay. What looked like she had a Purple Haze Experience, the Jimmy Hendrix kind, though it didn't turn out to be the worst case of a quick death.

She had a rough night and is agressive today when she first saw me this morning (which is a first) she ate down her worms I offered and hunted down her crickets like normal. However I didn't dust anything today due to the fact that I don't want to create a active state between minerals and chemicals. She pooped like normal and is active just think she has a bit of hangover. So I'll dust tomorrows food if she returns to 100% normal state.

Freaked me out but it didn't turn out to be what the previous posted mentioned. Thats a good thing.
 
I think if the chameleon eats the soil from his pot, there is a reason for it. I keep clean topsoil in my plants so that they have fresh soil if they feel the need to eat it. I don't think it should be covered with rocks because eating the soil may be needed in their diet.
 
From what i"ve read, soil eaters are either extraxting nutrients missing from their diet or attempting to use soil to dislodge parasites from their gut. Of all my chams , only one regularly eats dirt , so all things being equal, and all eating the same diet , it stands to reason that this one cham has a poor absorbtion of certain nutrients or has parasites.Might be time for a stool sample to the vet?
 
The reason(s) why some chameleons like to eat dirt is unknown.
The two theories you present are possible, but purely speculative.
A fecal test never hurts, but I don't consider eating dirt a reason to have one done.

-Brad
 
I know this thread is old, but I have to ask.
I currently have smooth river rocks covering the dirt in my live plants. They are still in the soil that I bought them in. Should i replant them and remove the rocks?
 
Ellron said:
I know this thread is old, but I have to ask.
I currently have smooth river rocks covering the dirt in my live plants. They are still in the soil that I bought them in. Should i replant them and remove the rocks?
Click to expand...

As long as the cham doesn't have access to the dirt I wouldn't see the need to transplant.
 
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