Inducing hibernation?

[Dan]

Hey,
So I was reading a few books I have on chameleon care, and one of them talked about inducing your chameleon into hibernation once or twice a year. This can be done by fasting your cham for several days and decreasing the temp and humdity...along with a few other things. It said this will help prolong the life of the chameleon.

has anyone ever heard of anything like this? if so...is it a good thing to do?

 

[CammieNLeno]

Its called Brumation

You can read up about it here -

http://lllreptile.com/info/library/care-and-husbandry-articles/-/reptilian-brumation/

If you dont feel like reading the entire article (which you should, its fascinating) Here is the summary of the article -

Before closing, I would like to re-emphasize that both in the wild and in captivity, brumation is risky business for reptiles. It puts a great strain on their bodies, but one that is nonetheless necessary to the survival of their species.

In short, no - its not worth it.

 

[Eric Adrignola]

that depends on the species. For veileds, it's not. I have had about a dozen deremensis. Never had one live for more than two years until I shut them down for the winter with a brumination period.

They build up a fat store, and if not allowed to go into a semi-hibernation, they die of fatty liver disease/liver failure.

 

[Mcfluffin]

Can I just rebump ths thread...I am interested in this subject because I had also read about it as common practice in the first book I ever got on chams. Since then all my other books don't really mention it, and I rarely hear anyone talking about it...

I think it would be good to hear people's accounts of what species might benefit/have benefitted from this...does anyone else have any experience of brumation in captivity?

 

[Klemins]

Eric,

Do you know anything about Kinyongia Tenue? I'm considering picking some up, and know they come from the same/similar areas as deremensis. Just curious if they'd need brumation as well. Thanks

 

[kinyonga]

All of my reptiles go through a mild brumation in that the temperatures in the house are much hotter in the summer than the winter so the cages are cooler in the winter and allow for a slowdown.


Eric said..."They build up a fat store, and if not allowed to go into a semi-hibernation, they die of fatty liver disease/liver failure"...what if they were not "allowed" to build up fat? Maybe they wouldn't need to be brumated?

 

[PardalisGirl]

Hi Dan...

Hi there Dan....Don't worry about hibernation with your two panthers. You don't want to induce any kind of hibernation with them. They might go through a slight seasonal slowdown here in America depending on where you live. I live in the rainy Pacific Northwest and the chameleons can see the darkness through the windows and the rooms are darker in the winter. I try to combat this by putting in brighter lighting (without overheating of course). Some of my Veileds and Panthers do slow down their eating a bit in the darker rainy months here. Others do not. This slight change is fine and somewhat normal. Inducing any drastic change for a Veiled or Panther would not be healthy. I want to see some pictures of that male you have

 

[reyesjoshuacruz]

eric, i rem you writing about how melleri are often times overfed and in turn become overweight. it seemed like melleri more so then average chams storing fat and becoming overweight

would adult melleri go through this process in nature as a result?