First cham coming soon

[jamest0o0]

Plan to have my first chameleon(male panther) next month. There are so many sites and stores for feeders, plus the need for variety, gutloading, supplementation, etc so i'm not really sure where to start. I've been reading a lot and have an idea, but just want to make sure everything is perfect when my cham finally arrives. I'd like to have my feeders ready and a weekly routine in place for feeding. Would you guys recommend ordering online? That would probably be easiest for me, but this will be my only reptile(for now lol) so bulk orders of bugs would probably die before i could feed them all.

I'm taking a lot of college classes atm, i have time and all for the cham of course, but a routine to make things as simple as possible would be a great help.

Any links on the subject would help a ton too.

 

[Lizzie The Chameleon]

https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/caresheets/panther/

 

[Alexander1]

If you order small silkworm cups they're small enough for the smallest chams and are very good feeder choice
1/4'' crickets on hand with some good vegetables to gut load
Very small hormworns but they grow very fast.
Black soldier fly larvae are high in calcium, you would have to pick out the smaller ones
Coastalsilkworms.com
@nick barta is a site sponsor he has a lot of small feeders, you can find him in the market section under gutloads and feeders
Mulberryfarms.com also Hs a good variety of feeders

 

[Alexander1]

Once he gets older you can keep changing up his diet. As long as you gut load all your critters you should be ok.

 

[Andee]

I recommend raising a lot of your own feeders in small numbers, if you need to you can almost always sell off extras and make some extra cash. But it really save money and you'd be surprised how much a baby Cham can eat. God I went through so much food with just one chameleon in the beginning XD. He was eating 22 small crickets every day. If you need a routine I strongly recommend training him to cup feed. It makes everything extremely easy. Though I do always recommend when you have a not so busy day during the week to have a free range day set aside.

 

[Angelwolf]

I get crickets from Ghann's. I usually order about 250 of the medium sized ones, which allows them to last longer in my care. I have food and water, and a "cricket" keeper, which keeps them going just fine. I have 1 lizard, also, and those crickets usually last a good 2 weeks. The other nice thing, is that they carry banded crickets, not the "normal" brown cricket. The banded ones tend to live longer, and make less noise. Also, they aren't cannibalistic, like the brown ones. Definitely the best way to go. They end up being much cheaper, too, even with the shipping charges. The only problem that I have is winter shipping, or the lack thereof. I live in NW PA, so winter's are pretty harsh.

 

[Graves923]

As mentioned above, cup feeding is very helpful. I just got my little veiled yesterday and he is already shooting crickets out of the feeder cup. Still skittish but if I walk away from the cage it doesnt take long for him to wonder over to the cup and start eating. I also like to monitor how much he eats so the cup feeding is great for that.

I plan to keep his diet changing come the spring time but at the moment I can only use crickets and superworms. local pet shops dont carry anything else and its too cold to have bugs shipped since Im at work all day. The feeder would be dead by the time I got home.

Gutloading with a mix of fresh veggies (carrots, kale, squash) and bug burger gutload food. Every now and then my girlfriend throws in an orange or apple slice too.

As for routine, whatever works for you. I have lights on at 7:30am and mist, feed at 11am on my lunch break and mist before I leave, mist again at 5pm and clean if need be then lights out at 7:30pm. Supplement schedule is exactly what the caresheet for my veiled says on this site. Ill adjust if I need to as time goes on.

 

[nick barta]

James,

If you are getting a young chameleon (12 weeks old or so) You will need some small feeders, if he is 9 months + old, you can get feeders 2-inches and down in size. I can supply you with small feeders (As Alexander said, go to the Chamelonforum.com Classifieds, my ad is under Feeders, my ad is Feeders for happy Chameleons). For a variety of larger feeders in small quantity, I recommend lindasgonebuggie.com. She lets you get smaller amounts, and always has specials on Facebook and her web page. My email is [email protected] if you have any questions on what you need.

CHEERS!

Nick Barta

 

[jamest0o0]

Thanks for all of the info! sorry i'm just getting back to this now.

So I need calc w.o d3 daily, multivitamin once every other week, and calc with d3 once a week? I believe that's what i read, i'll have to double check though.

As for feeders, what do you guys think of substituting dubias for crickets as the staple? I've never used them, but other than being roaches(gasp) they seem to be the better choice. They can't climb, don't smell, easy to raise, good nutrition, etc right? My gf won't like it lol, but in the past i've used crickets for other reptiles and they were such a hassle. I don't mind using them though if i have to, just couldn't stand them making noise, smelling, and generally running amok.

I'd like to try different feeders out when he's full grown, but for my go-to's atm, would dubias, crickets, silkworms, and hornworms be okay? I don't know much about the worms, just seen them mentioned a lot and figured they wouldn't be too difficult to deal with. Could i raise all of these myself in small numbers? I haven't looked at shipping prices or anything yet either so i could see that being a problem. I'm in PA as well and the winters more or less suck.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated thanks all, happy new year.

 

[JacksJill]

A dubia are a great choice. My BF's colony has grown so much that he's starting to sell off starter colonies.
The small dubia don't look that gross. Just don't let her see the adults. They stlll give me the willies.

 

[jamest0o0]

Cool thanks, they freak me out a little too tbh, but from what i hear the dubias are great food and can't reproduce in this climate so i can deal with it. Do all feeders get dusted the same? Just wondering because i'd imagine different bugs have different nutrition.

 

[Peachypink]

Thanks for all of the info! sorry i'm just getting back to this now.

So I need calc w.o d3 daily, multivitamin once every other week, and calc with d3 once a week? I believe that's what i read, i'll have to double check though.

As for feeders, what do you guys think of substituting dubias for crickets as the staple? I've never used them, but other than being roaches(gasp) they seem to be the better choice. They can't climb, don't smell, easy to raise, good nutrition, etc right? My gf won't like it lol, but in the past i've used crickets for other reptiles and they were such a hassle. I don't mind using them though if i have to, just couldn't stand them making noise, smelling, and generally running amok.

I'd like to try different feeders out when he's full grown, but for my go-to's atm, would dubias, crickets, silkworms, and hornworms be okay? I don't know much about the worms, just seen them mentioned a lot and figured they wouldn't be too difficult to deal with. Could i raise all of these myself in small numbers? I haven't looked at shipping prices or anything yet either so i could see that being a problem. I'm in PA as well and the winters more or less suck.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated thanks all, happy new year.

Calcium w/o D3 6 days a week.
Calcium with D3 2x a month
Multi 2x a month

Pick a day and make it your D3 or Multi day....You can alternate a day week between the D3 an Multi to make it easy. So, Multi weeks 1 and 3 and then D3 weeks 2 and 4. Don't give the plain calcium the same day you give the multi or D3.

 

[Andee]

I usually don't dust naturally high in calcium feeders like black soldier fly larvae or silkworms/hornworms

 

[jamest0o0]

Thank you guys, very helpful!