Symbiot
New Member
This is great to know, thank you. I've been looking into finding a good vet that can deal with chameleons and I live in the Orlando area. Appreciate the information.
Kind of a Rant, Kind of a Question, Kind of Crazy?
- Thread starter kongchi
- Start date
This is great to know, thank you. I've been looking into finding a good vet that can deal with chameleons and I live in the Orlando area. Appreciate the information.
jannb
Chameleon Enthusiast
You are welcome. I guarantee that you will be extremely satisfied with Dr. Alfonso's chameleon knowledge.
You sid..."I worry about vitamin A because its one of the important vitamins that ties in with calcium and MBD prevention. I did not want to go through the prEformed vitamin A because I was scared of it being too toxic"...calcium, D3, phos. and vitamin A are all important players in bone health and need to be in balance....but the vitamin A is antagonistic somewhat to the D3 which I think is the main reason for even mentioning it/bringing it into the balance. Vitamin A (as well as the other nutrients) also serves other purposes in the body as well.
The reason I always use the vitamin with beta carotene is that it can not build up in the system because it can only serve a purpose if its converted...and it leaves the chameleon's owner to control the amount of prEformed vitamin A given to the chameleon, if any.
As far as insects and vitamin A...they should all have some retinyl in their eyes...but I can't find anything that says they have it other places...but I suspect that at least some of them store it in a different manner than reptiles or mammals do. I keep working on finding this out...but have very little concrete information so far.
This site explains some of it...
http://web.archive.org/web/20060502...rnals.com/vet/index.php?show=5.Vitamin.A.html
http://web.archive.org/web/20060421.../index.php?show=6.Vitamin.D3.and.Calcium.html
You said..."I feed my cham Kale and that's a good source of vitamin A"...the vitamin A in kale and other greens and veggies is prOformed though and has to be converted....so if the chameleon can not convert vitamin A then it wouldn't do it any good. (And I'm not saying that chameleons can or can't convert it...I'm just pointing it out.)
I can tell you that I use only Rep-cal with and without D3 and Herptivite (as described by me many times on this forum) and I gutload/feed the crickets, etc. with a wide assortment of greens and veggies as I've described many times on here. I have also mentioned that I have no control over what the insects are fed before they come to me so I can not be sure how much prEformed vitamin A they would have or retain after I've gutloaded/fed them. Keeping my veileds, for example, the way I do most of the females live to be over 6 and the males even longer. If they were lacking nutrients or over-supplemented, I would have thought that it would be showing up.
Sorry I can't give you any more concrete answers than this.
The reason I always use the vitamin with beta carotene is that it can not build up in the system because it can only serve a purpose if its converted...and it leaves the chameleon's owner to control the amount of prEformed vitamin A given to the chameleon, if any.
As far as insects and vitamin A...they should all have some retinyl in their eyes...but I can't find anything that says they have it other places...but I suspect that at least some of them store it in a different manner than reptiles or mammals do. I keep working on finding this out...but have very little concrete information so far.
This site explains some of it...
http://web.archive.org/web/20060502...rnals.com/vet/index.php?show=5.Vitamin.A.html
http://web.archive.org/web/20060421.../index.php?show=6.Vitamin.D3.and.Calcium.html
You said..."I feed my cham Kale and that's a good source of vitamin A"...the vitamin A in kale and other greens and veggies is prOformed though and has to be converted....so if the chameleon can not convert vitamin A then it wouldn't do it any good. (And I'm not saying that chameleons can or can't convert it...I'm just pointing it out.)
I can tell you that I use only Rep-cal with and without D3 and Herptivite (as described by me many times on this forum) and I gutload/feed the crickets, etc. with a wide assortment of greens and veggies as I've described many times on here. I have also mentioned that I have no control over what the insects are fed before they come to me so I can not be sure how much prEformed vitamin A they would have or retain after I've gutloaded/fed them. Keeping my veileds, for example, the way I do most of the females live to be over 6 and the males even longer. If they were lacking nutrients or over-supplemented, I would have thought that it would be showing up.
Sorry I can't give you any more concrete answers than this.
kongchi
New Member
I really don't think there is alot of funding out there that goes into the studies of chameleons, your answer is as good as all the others out there Kinyonga.
Who knows, what if someone accidentally discovers a food out there that gives your chameleons wings. It may be a weird food that NO ONE who cares about chameleons would give them, like lime juice or habaneros, or maybe even gummy bears.
Who knows, what if someone accidentally discovers a food out there that gives your chameleons wings. It may be a weird food that NO ONE who cares about chameleons would give them, like lime juice or habaneros, or maybe even gummy bears.
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