First Veiled Cham

[tomylv]

Hi everybody!! I just got my first chameleon, i've had it for about a week. It's a male veiled chameleon, I think he must be about 3 months old. I've got him on a reptibreeze medium cage, it's 16" x 16" x 30". I've blocked the lower half of the cage and I'm planning on leaving it that way until he gets a bit older.

I've got UVB lamp and a 50W heating lamp. I've got the temperature at about 71 with a basking spot of 85.

He's eating around 10 crickets a day, I feed him on the first half of the day.

I would appreciate any advice you can give me! I've added a couple of pictures so you can see him. I don't have any real plants for the moment.

 

[dom1959]

sounds like you are off to a great start!
keep learning about your cham and you both will be fine

 

[NHenn]

Welcome to the forums! What a cute little guy, who doesn't love baby veiled!

Glad to see you have a good setup for him and are proving him a good home! If you want some additional information on husbandry I would check out https://www.chameleonforums.com/basic-husbandry-38769/

 

[Beautiful4Ever]

Sounds like you are doing good He is absolutely adorable! I love it when baby chameleons puff up

 

[ThatDigitalChameleon]

I'm sure you know this already but, make sure the crickets aren't too big for him... i can't tell exactly how big he is... just a concern.

Make sure you not over/under supplementing him as well.

Chams grow pretty quick so take pics of the baby while you can. It's just like having a son and time flies.

 

[tomylv]

he's pretty small, but yeah.. i have a cricket pen and get rid of the ones that get too big for him..

for the supplements, i'm kinda just adding a little on the crickets before feeding, and i'm gut loading them with some papaya and apple.. how much of the supplement is enough?? i use the rep-cal multivitamins and calcium (white containers with blue and pink)

 

[ThatDigitalChameleon]

you dn't have to "waste" the larger crickets, i breed them and it's actually pretty easy... just anoying sometimes

As for dusting i add a small amount to them and shake them til their colors go from brown to light brown. and you don't give vitamins every day do you? as for the calcium, is it phosphorous free and with or with out d3. Phosphorous free w/out d3 (tee hee... it rhymes) should give given almost every feeding and d3 should be every other week and multivitamin should be once or twice a month.

Not sure your schedule or how your supplementing, like i said. But here's my schedule.
sun mon calcium no d3
tue. calcium d3 or vitamin (every other tuesday alternates)
wed-sat no d3
(i use repcal too... reasonably priced and good reputation)

 

[tomylv]

i've been supplementing every other day, i think i'm going to stick to your schedule and see how that works..

thanks for the help!!

 

[jmacphee9]

he is younger then 3 months IMO, by a little bit, i would age him at 2 months max but it is hard to tell without something to size him next to. for comparison, my veiled at 5-6 weeks

also i feel worth noting, your chameleon should( more like WILL BE) ok in that cage without blocking any of it off. its a great size for starting a chameleon in, and it is plenty small enough for him to hunt crickets without any issue.