Interesting article although not specifically about chameleons…
“we elucidate four major findings: (i) closely-related lizard species harbor distinct gut bacterial microbiota that remain distinguishable in captivity; a considerable portion of gut bacterial diversity (39.1%) in nature overlap with that found on plant material, (ii) captivity changes bacterial community composition, though host-specific communities are retained, (iii) fecal samples are largely representative of the hindgut bacterial community, and thus represent acceptable sources for nondestructive sampling, and (iv) lizards born in captivity and separated from their mothers within 24 hours shared 34.3% of their gut bacterial diversity with their mothers, suggestive of maternal or environmental transmission. Each of these findings represents the first time such a topic has been investigated in lizard hosts”…
https://www.researchgate.net/public...variation_across_gut_regions_and_transmission
“we elucidate four major findings: (i) closely-related lizard species harbor distinct gut bacterial microbiota that remain distinguishable in captivity; a considerable portion of gut bacterial diversity (39.1%) in nature overlap with that found on plant material, (ii) captivity changes bacterial community composition, though host-specific communities are retained, (iii) fecal samples are largely representative of the hindgut bacterial community, and thus represent acceptable sources for nondestructive sampling, and (iv) lizards born in captivity and separated from their mothers within 24 hours shared 34.3% of their gut bacterial diversity with their mothers, suggestive of maternal or environmental transmission. Each of these findings represents the first time such a topic has been investigated in lizard hosts”…
https://www.researchgate.net/public...variation_across_gut_regions_and_transmission
