Expert advice needed regarding Trioceros jacksonii merumontanus

[jims]

Hello,

I'm fairly new in keeping chameleons, hence the need of your expert advice.
I started last august with a young male ambilobe. He's doing really well and I found myself getting more and more interested in these wonderful little creatures. I've been thinking for a while to get a Trioceros jacksonii xantholophus as they are fairly easy to find where I live, but I always thought that I should first get more experienced with my panther before getting another species which, according to what I've read, needs more special requirements.
Last week, I have been informed a shipment of Merumontanus from Tanzania have arrived and I've always wanted a pair of those. They are not easy to find over here, and I know I should act fast, but I also really do not want to make any impulsive decision. So here are my questions :
Should I wait and get more experience with panthers or do you think I'm ready to try jacksons?
I don't know yet if these meru comes from a farm or are WC. Does it make any difference ? I've read that it's better to get CB chameleons as they are more healthy, but really, I don't know. What do you think ?

Thank you for your help !

 

[Forestdellic]

I am not an expert on chameleons but I do have some years of experience in reptiles.

WC animals are usually very difficult to take care of. They are not used to humans at all and will often view you as a threat, the jump between wild environment to a controlled one can be big and its very difficult to replicate that mostly because you don't know where they've been found, how their lifestyle is, what they were being fed, light cycle...etc so be prepared for a lot of behavior issues and aggressiveness/stress. There is also the risk of parasites (external and internal) and disease as well. You don't know exactly what you're buying or what you are getting into, for all you know, you could be shedding out a lot dough for an animal that was doomed from the start.

Captive Breeding is a lot easier because from day 1 they have been in a controlled environment, were used to humans being around, you get a lot more detail from the owner such as diet, growth rate, parents, genetic line, get all the right nutrients, you can view their setup, ask about temperature ranges/light cycle they have been given, they get all the right nutrients...etc Generally the major benefit is that they are healthier than WC species.

Speaking from wisdom of making loads of mistakes and loads of impulsive buys I keep in mind a quote from Dalai Llama

"Sometimes not getting what you want is an extreme strike of luck"

If I were you I would wait. With bearded dragons, in my case, I waited at least a year and took care of my animal for a year before I got another one.

If you can afford the jackson and his care and have the time for it, I don't see why not but imo I would wait. Its always better to wait

Hope this helped in someway!

 

[leedragon]

you need to expet parasites right off, so you have to be comfortable treating them, just watch what happen to the quadricornies import, secound is money, because of the medicins and the vet visits you need to be prepare to put out soen nayve 300 dollars on them, then is food jacksoniis and specially wild caught get tired really quick by the same feeder, so no cricket for one mounth straight will do, you need atleast differents feeders in a weak, probably more, temperatures, merus like it cold I belive even to 8 celcius at night, you may want to goodle that last thing out to find it precisly, and you will need a good habbit of appropriately gutloadning, low in oxal accid and carrots, becuase oversuplemantasion may kill them, specially d3.

this are the first thing to keep in mind, but if you make it, I want to see pictures

 

[jims]

Thank you very much for your replies.
I have finally decided to not go through with it as they are indeed quite expensive (250 € / animal) and since i'm not experienced enough, i'm afraid they might not last.
Thanks for your wise answers.

 

[jims]

I'm digging out my own thread.
I talked to one of the manager of the reptile store and it turns out that the merus are captive bred... He assured me that they were parasites free, but also insisted on the fact that these chameleons absolutely need a big gap in temperature between day and night and that I were to get one, I would absolutely need to provide it for them with no more than 15ºC (59ºF) at night and around 25ºC (77ºF) during the day, as otherwise they would die.
Day temps would not be a problem to achieve, but night temps might be more problematic, especially during summer. I don't have air conditioning in my house as summers where I live are not long and not that hot. So I was wondering how do you manage to get such low temperatures especially for all of you that live in warm places like California or Florida. Do you use AC ?
Thank you.

 

[leedragon]

he is right due, merus are more fragil than xanthos and willigensis, have he proof of they ar cb? pcitures several youngs of the sam age or something?

 

[Action Jackson]

I agree that cool night temperatures a important when keeping Meru's. 60 degrees is a good average night temp to shoot for but obviously temperatures are not constant in the wild so fluctuations in night temps are fine. Mine see night temperatures fron 40f to sometimes 70f in summer.

WC Merus are very difficult to acclimate if not in really good condition. I myself have tried WC Merus with bad results. I went to great lengths and expense to acquire CB specimens for my breeding project.

I would say if you can personally inspect them or see good pictures of them and they look good go ahead and get them. They should have good color showing, nice greens and look hydrated. I never have problems with parasites and Jackson's but have them checked if you're concerned.

 

[jims]

Ok. Thanks. I'm going back to the store tomorrow, will take pictures, post them and you can tell me what you all think.

 

[kinyonga]

I've kept a few merus over the years and found them to be less trouble to keep than xanths.

I did the supplementing the same way I did for the veileds and panthers....phos.-free calcium at most feedings, phos.-free calcium/D3 twice a month lightly and a vitamin powder with a beta carotene source of vitamin A twice a month.

I kept the cages in the high 70'sF during the day with a basking area in the low 80'sF. Night temps would have been no lower than 65F.

I suppose I was just lucky, but parasites didn't seem to be a big issue with them....and they were all WC.

I made sure they were well watered and they were fed mostly a diet of well fed/gutloaded crickets with some superworms, waxworms, etc. from time to time.

Crickets were fed a wide assortment of greens such as dandelions, collards, kale, endive, escarole, etc. and veggies such as carrots, sweet potatoes, sweet red pepper, squash, zucchini, etc.

 

[jajeanpierre]

you need to expet parasites right off, so you have to be comfortable treating them, just watch what happen to the quadricornies import, secound is money, because of the medicins and the vet visits you need to be prepare to put out soen nayve 300 dollars on them, then is food jacksoniis and specially wild caught get tired really quick by the same feeder, so no cricket for one mounth straight will do, you need atleast differents feeders in a weak, probably more, temperatures, merus like it cold I belive even to 8 celcius at night, you may want to goodle that last thing out to find it precisly, and you will need a good habbit of appropriately gutloadning, low in oxal accid and carrots, becuase oversuplemantasion may kill them, specially d3.

this are the first thing to keep in mind, but if you make it, I want to see pictures

I think treating a wild caught for parasites early in its acclimation process is a huge mistake. They need a long time to get over the whole capture/export/import experience. They will not have been given good care for probably weeks before they finally make it into the pet store. The most important thing you can do for a recent wild caught is hydrate it.

If you try to deparasitize a newly imported wild caught, you could very well kill it. It comes in dehydrated and stressed and then you give it meds that damage kidneys if the animal is dehydrated, which it likely is. Plus you stress it by handling it.

The owner of the store that imported all those quadricornis you are talking about told me specifically to NOT worm them for a long time. He advised me to let them get over being captured and shipped. He also said to worm them with a lighter dose of meds so as not to shock the heck out of their system. With an immune system severely compromised by the stress of capture and shipping, the parasite load will sky rocket. He recounted to me how he deals with some imported tortoises. I'm not familiar with tortoises, but he told me he soaks them every day and they would expel massive quantities of live parasites. He continues to soak them daily, and they continued to expel these massive quantities of live parasites until they didn't anymore. He believes that they deal with their massive parasite problem on their own. He is not a vet, of course, and doesn't necessarily have it right. Some of the latest research into reptiles and parasites is leaning towards not completely eradicating parasites in healthy reptiles (per my vet).

I bought two adult male quads from that first December shipment. I also bought seven quads from the February shipment: an adult gravid gracilior, an almost adult male gracilior, and five baby quad quads ranging in size from 12g to 17g. The gravid gracilior was not wormed (per my vet's advice) until after she laid her clutch. She has thrived. Of the nine wc quads I bought, I lost one small male to lungworms (per necropsy). I've had issues with the two from the December import but they are doing well.

You are correct that they cost me a lot of money to try to get healthy, some more than others.

 

[leedragon]

I think treating a wild caught for parasites early in its acclimation process is a huge mistake. They need a long time to get over the whole capture/export/import experience. They will not have been given good care for probably weeks before they finally make it into the pet store. The most important thing you can do for a recent wild caught is hydrate it.

If you try to deparasitize a newly imported wild caught, you could very well kill it. It comes in dehydrated and stressed and then you give it meds that damage kidneys if the animal is dehydrated, which it likely is. Plus you stress it by handling it.

The owner of the store that imported all those quadricornis you are talking about told me specifically to NOT worm them for a long time. He advised me to let them get over being captured and shipped. He also said to worm them with a lighter dose of meds so as not to shock the heck out of their system. With an immune system severely compromised by the stress of capture and shipping, the parasite load will sky rocket. He recounted to me how he deals with some imported tortoises. I'm not familiar with tortoises, but he told me he soaks them every day and they would expel massive quantities of live parasites. He continues to soak them daily, and they continued to expel these massive quantities of live parasites until they didn't anymore. He believes that they deal with their massive parasite problem on their own. He is not a vet, of course, and doesn't necessarily have it right. Some of the latest research into reptiles and parasites is leaning towards not completely eradicating parasites in healthy reptiles (per my vet).

I bought two adult male quads from that first December shipment. I also bought seven quads from the February shipment: an adult gravid gracilior, an almost adult male gracilior, and five baby quad quads ranging in size from 12g to 17g. The gravid gracilior was not wormed (per my vet's advice) until after she laid her clutch. She has thrived. Of the nine wc quads I bought, I lost one small male to lungworms (per necropsy). I've had issues with the two from the December import but they are doing well.

You are correct that they cost me a lot of money to try to get healthy, some more than others.

you are probably right but things given many of them will die before they manage to recovere to 100 %

 

[MeruJack]

I have 12 chameleons. Six of them are Mt. Meru Dwarf Jackson's. Three are juveniles, three are adults. Two were wild caught, four were not. I feel that this species is NOT difficult to keep. Make sure they get enough to drink and that they don't get too hot. They are a great species and both the males and females are very cute in appearance and gentle in personality.

 

[jims]

I just came back from the store. it wasn't easy to take a picture as the merus were way in the back...

Merumontanus
Female in the foreground and male behind. They were actually quite dark...

Xantholophus Adults

Babies xantholophus

Sorry for the poor quality.

The Xantholophus looked much better than the merus and were very active (especially the young ones).

Let me know what you think.

 

[leedragon]

it will be good if you can house the separately, if the female is wild caught she may as well be pregnant, and being with a male will prove to be too stressed for her.

I have 12 chameleons. Six of them are Mt. Meru Dwarf Jackson's. Three are juveniles, three are adults. Two were wild caught, four were not. I feel that this species is NOT difficult to keep. Make sure they get enough to drink and that they don't get too hot. They are a great species and both the males and females are very cute in appearance and gentle in personality.

cool how long have you had them? maind sharing some inside in your housbandry