Cold Chameleon Delivery

lrg83caleb

lrg83caleb

New Member
I recieved a shipment of 4 spectral chamleons today. When I got them out of the box they were very cold. The heat packs were spent. I figured that they were dead.
After a couple of minutes they began to move. Their eyes would open and then close. One at a time I placed them in their terrarium and have kept an eye on them since then.
It isn't looking good. They hardly have the energy to move or open their eyes still.
Suggestions?....................
 
They are a Pygmy Chameleon.
I am several hours into this now.
I allowed them to warm to room temperature and then placed them in the terrarium. I followed up with a good, warm mist. I'm tempted to spray again.
 
I got 3 of the 4 chams to eat this morning. It was an expensive breakfast. They each ate 2 tiny horn worms. 2 of the three that ate also took down a small silk worm.
Still worried about them though.
 
Just keep them warm and spray them several times a day with good warm water. Hopefully they will all do fine. Fingers crossed.
 
Pygmy's are surprisingly resilient and they should come round after a day or two. Spraying twice a day or in your normal routine should be fine once they have warmed up. If their eating and moving around even if its slowly it’s a good sign.
 
I haven't seen the male in 3 days now.
There is a distinct smell in the tank telling me that something is dead.
My question may seem a bit gruesome, but here I go.
There are 3 other stressed out chameleons in that terrarium that are just beginning to settle in. Should I pull all 3 out and break the cage down to find the little guy? Or should I let the clean up crew of insects take care of it? My main concern here is the stress level of the chameleons.
 
Personally, I'd take him out... I wouldn't feel right if my other chameleons ate bugs that were eating the chameleon... I'd try to pull some branches around and look that way first before I took out the others, but if I couldn't find him I'd take them out. Did they come with a health guarantee? Plus there could be some mold issues or some other health issue that could cause problems.
 
I found him under a log on the bottom of the cage. I sent a pic to the seller. I hope we can work something out.
It's sad that he made the trip from Africa to die in my terrarium.
 
Thanks Sandra.
The others are eating and drinking well. They still want to close their eyes during the day, but we are hopeful.
 
You chose a species that is more difficult than the more common pygmies. I have kept R. spectrums in the past and found them to be moderately hardy if they weren't stressed and had adequate height to their enclosure. When you say you are keeping them in a terrarium, I assume that you mean a tropical habitat in an aquarium? I have found that these guys need more air flow than R. brevicaudatus so an aquarium might not be sufficient. I had the best luck with a screen enclosure on top of a 20 gallon long aquarium for a pair. They have to be misted regularly with the screen eclosure since it dries out faster than a tank alone. These guys also climb more and generally go higher up in the bushes than most common pygmies so height is important. Good luck with them and hopefully you have success keeping and possibly breeding them. Here is a pic of one that i kept:
PICS8-5-06114-3.jpg
 
Last edited:
lrg83caleb said:
I found him under a log on the bottom of the cage. I sent a pic to the seller. I hope we can work something out.
It's sad that he made the trip from Africa to die in my terrarium.
Click to expand...

I'm curious as to why someone would purchase WC chams in lieu of CB chams. If we stop buying WC wouldn't that lessen the chance of being the one that caused their death. Or am I just :confused:naive?
 
draetish said:
I'm curious as to why someone would purchase WC chams in lieu of CB chams. If we stop buying WC wouldn't that lessen the chance of being the one that caused their death. Or am I just :confused:naive?
Click to expand...

This is a whole other topic that should be left to a separate thread.

Back to the Spectrals: I have 2.4 of them (yes, WC) and keep them the way that Jerm has suggested and they have been very hardy thus far. One of my females has even laid 2 eggs, which I have left in their enclosure because she buried them all nice and neat below some sphagnum moss. I believe it is the mother of those eggs who I see walking around that area at least once per day, possibly checking on her eggs (?).

I, too, had an issue with them coming in cold and thought they were all dead. (PM me with the person's name who you got them from. If it is the same one that I think it is, I have had issues with stuff coming in dead from them before and I can give you some suggestions on how to go about it.) I think that when in transportation, chams in general just close their eyes, shut down and go along for the ride praying for it to be over. That, however, is just my personal opinion due to my own experiences with various species (WC and CB). :) Anyway, after giving them a bit of time to warm up, these little guys went into their enclosures and perked up throughout the day. Just give it a bit and you may see some improvemet. I would, however, watch those worms. While I'm sure they are "small" worms, these guys are pretty tiny and you would need some aweful small ones to feed them. FL Chams has a really great food chart for pygmys on their pygmy (brev.) care sheet that might be worth taking a look at.

Good luck with these guys. They are a great pygmy species and I have enjoyed them. :)
 
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