First-time Owner

[SaraSondermann]

Hello all! I just joined today, and I just bought my first chameleon yesterday. I've owned dogs, cats, snakes, hedgehogs, ferrets, geckos, but I've never owned a chameleon before!

She's a female, I sexed her at the pet store after researching the species. I named her Desmond. I'm not sure on her age, if you have any suggestions please let me know! She seems a couple inches long in length, but she's pretty tiny!

I'm sure I'll have a lot of questions, so I thought it would be good to join a forum. I'll post pictures of her soon!

 

[SoCal Soldier]

Welcome, what kind of chameleon did you get?

 

[camimom]

Welcome! If you want to know age, we need to see a pic of her on your hand,

 

[DirtyDubbz]

Congratulations on your chameleon I would suggest as a starter to get an all screen cage the a UVB reptisun5.0 light and basking light and always gut load your feeders DONT OVER DO SUPPLIMENTS the best rule of thumb I would suggest is calcium NO D3 every other feeding and calcium D3 and a multivitamin 2 times a month those are some basics I'm sure you will hear a lot of other tricks and helping hints

 

[SaraSondermann]

Picture

Thanks for the warm welcome! Here's the picture I took of her last night. Sorry, I don't know how to rotate it, so it's sideways...! And she's a female veiled chameleon.

 

[DirtyDubbz]

Very cute chameleon she is still very young is her eye closed because of the picture or do you see it closed often she might need some antibiotics if that is a normal occurNce

 

[SaraSondermann]

She doesn't seem to have it closed often, but I got her from a pet store so there may be something there that I didn't know about before. I was going to call my vet today anyway to get some more information, so I'll probably ask about that too. Thanks!

 

[DirtyDubbz]

No problem the vet will want a fecal sample to check for parasites the fresher it is the better lol but I believe she is too young for a blood test usually the fecal test is between 15-25 dollars visits shouldn't be more than a hundred dollars and thank you for saving a chameleon from the pet store ! Pm me if you have any questions

 

[Olimpia]

Hello and welcome! Congrats on the little girl!

To get you started, just in case, here is the forum's chameleon resources section: https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/chameleons/
It covers everything from caging to feeding and all other good stuff, so it's worth looking over to make sure you have all your bases covered.

And here is the veiled-specific care sheet: https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/caresheets/veiled/

How to care for a female veiled, specifically: http://raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.blogspot.com/2007/12/keeping-female-veiled.html

And how to set up a laying bin for her when she's a little older (by about 5-6 months of age) in a convenient video: https://www.chameleonforums.com/laying-bin-set-up-educational-video-77225/

That should be everything you need to know to get you started with Desmond If you need anything else just ask.

Keep an eye on how often she closes those eyes. That's typically a bad sign that something may be brewing, either stress or something more, so pay attention to how often she's doing that, mention it to your vet if you go in for a check-up, and make sure everything in her cage is as it should be.