Has anyone ever seen a chameleon eat such a large prey item? That's ~23% of her size. The iguana was 3" from nose to anus, and 11" nose to tail. She was in a large outdoor greenhouse type enclosure, and i had left the door open awhile while measuring and weighing her. I guess a baby iguana must have slipped in before I put her back in her enclosure. I checked on her about an hour later and she had all but the feet and some of the tail swallowed. I attempted to pull it out since she is so small and didn't want her to choke, but also didn't want to hurt her. I pulled some out and she refused to let go, and ate him (I cut off his tail to try and help her out). I had a bunch of baby iguanas hatch near me, so I was able to catch one of approximately the same size to weigh and measure it. She is also my heaviest eater, so she wasn't hungry; it must have been a territorial thing, but she is one of the sweetest of my chameleons and won't even eat large discoid/dubia roaches.
My petite, 64g veiled ate 14g iguana
- Thread starter MarkP6644
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jajeanpierre
Chameleon Enthusiast
For next time, don't pull anything out of their mouth or their vent. You can do a lot of damage.
guanagator
Avid Member
Don't feed her for a few days and make sure she's hydrated. Like @carol5208 I am in Florida and see anoles that end up eaten in the outdoor cages every once in awhile. Do a regular fecal because you don't know what the iguana could have been carrying.
Thanks. And I do understand that which is why I only started too try and pull it out but didn't...I wanted to make sure not to cause damage; but that would be better than her choking to death. I have seen young chameleons choke on too large of a cricket or roach.
And yeah; one of my favorite stories is of one of those curly tail lizards that got in one of my outdoor greenhouse enclosures, and my largest female veiled chasing it on the ground with her mouth wide open. I got in to chase it too, so it was me and her chasing this damn lizard...pretty funny to watch. But yeah I have seen them eat the small brown anoles...but never an iguana nearly their same size.
Thanks, I did put two small roaches in her cage this morning, but it has been ~50hrs now, and she has defecated once (I'll wait a couple more days to feed her though). I have a high powered microscope and access to vet equipment (via per-veterinary students), so I will do a re-check on that in a couple weeks as she has been fully checked previously.
Hopefully just the invasive brown ones, and/or knight (biting) anoles! Not the smaller green (though they can turn brown but don't have the pattern like the brown ones). BTW; those cuban tree frogs you see all around the florida area; it is recommended to put benzocaine on them then freeze them, they and the knight anoles are of the more harmful invasives!
@jajeanpierre http://www.ivis.org/proceedings/navc/2006/SAE/607.pdf?LA=1 My apologies for again having to correct your misinformation and provide sources; but certain times it is appropriate to have to use manual procedures for removing from the vent, and/or mouth of a chameleon.
Virgil1972
Avid Member
I don't see how see provided any misinformation at all. See said that pulling something out of a chams mouth can cause damage. She didn't say that vets haven't done it. And what does obstructed labor have to do with pulling and animal out of your chams mouth.
jajeanpierre
Chameleon Enthusiast
I'm at a loss. Your reference is regarding dystocia (inability to lay eggs) not removing anything from a vent or mouth. I have no problem being corrected if I'm wrong, but your references have nothing to do with the problem being discussed.
I'm also at a loss of when you have ever "corrected" any information I have shared with the Forum. Please, enlighten me; what have I missed?
The dystocia article referes directly to pulling something out of the vent. The pulling out an obstruction from the mouth should be a given for anyone with any medical knowledge, or common sense whatsover. I'll send you a 100 links to that if you'd like?
"Using general anesthesia with
propofol (Rapinovet 10mg/ml; Mallinckrodt Veterinary) at
5-10 mg/kg IV (tail vein or intracardiac) and/or isoflurane
eggs sometimes can be gently manipulated toward the
cloaca and removed."
Here's the quote, look it up on any veterinary encyclopedia if you'd like. Again, please stop giving false information and providing that on my threads and having your followers back you up. If you do not know what you are talking about, do not have the reference's to back up your claims, don't reply to my threads. My threads are meant for "discussion" (not false accusations and misinformation), meant for optimism, positive criticism, and like-minded chameleon/herp enthusiasts. (P.S. I have yet to see a single scientific article backing up anything you claim, yet I source all my claims and even spell out to you and your followers how they are relevant.)
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"don't pull anything out of their mouth or their vent" - @jajeanpierre
wavingsnail
Established Member
Why are you being such a prick about it? No misinformation was given. What was given was a broad generalization that typically speaking, especially for those WITHOUT veterinary training, manually removing something from the vent or mouth of a chameleon (or any animal) is not a good idea.
Your challenging and arrogant approach is a bit off putting and unnecessary.
I agree in a sense; but someone without veterinary experience should be given the advice to remove an obstructive object if necessary (instead of letting their chameleon/reptile/animal die just as a human being chocking on food). Again, my apologies and I do not mean to come off as a prick, but I would prefer for more appropriate and less "black and white" statements be given. I refer to my statement above that my threads are meant for positive discussion (as the forum states).
wavingsnail
Established Member
You can't react negatively to someone disagreeing with you and then call them out for not participating in "positive discussion" in the same breath (or post).
If an animal is actively choking then the argument can be made that, yes, removing the obstruction is better than letting the animal die.
However, citing veterinary articles about specific medically necessary events does little to back up your claim.
If an animal is actively choking then the argument can be made that, yes, removing the obstruction is better than letting the animal die.
However, citing veterinary articles about specific medically necessary events does little to back up your claim.
I'm not arguing with you @wavingsnail my article was specifically meant to dispose the comment towards "never remove something from their vent". The obstruction and choking hazard should be a given, as @jajeanpierre obviously made a point to try and argue with me about, and I am not appreciative of @jajeanpierre purposely coming to my threads to try and argue, yet providing misguided information to others who might read this. It might be a bit immature, speculative and possibly hipocritical of me to target @jajeanpierre and followers, which I do apologize for. They could however keep the negative comments to themselves and not try to gang up and call out others (as I have seen in much of their comment history), and instead do what they do best and only provide accurate and scientifically backed up information (not opinionated statements meant to attack others).
wavingsnail
Established Member
You were coming off pretty hostile. Part of a conversation is that there are two sides - more often than not these sides do not coincide.
An example I can provide you is this:
I am a nurse by trade. I understand that more often than not, you have to hurt to help. I have honestly lost track of the number of ribs I've broken on people while trying to bring them back from the dead.
I can also tell you that I've seen a lot of non-medically trained people harm or even kill other people they were TRYING to help by trying to do something WAY out of their scope of practice.
Through years of schooling, clinical and on the job training, I've learned how to deal with certain medical emergencies. Would I ever recommend that an untrained person attempt to intubate an unresponsive person? God no. In fact, in past educational capacities I've had, Ive actually had to explain to people that it is actually a very bad and dangerous idea to stab an unresponsive person in the neck and stick a straw in the hole to help them breathe.
Unfortunately because of the ease of access to medical journals and such thanks to the Internet, and the glamorization of an emergency tracheostomy in various shows and films, people have tried, and people have died.
Do you get what I mean? Just because something is hanging out of a lizards but doesn't mean that just ANYONE is qualified to pull that something out, even if they read an article about a vet doing it in an article someone cited on a forum.
Some things are just best left to the professionals.
An example I can provide you is this:
I am a nurse by trade. I understand that more often than not, you have to hurt to help. I have honestly lost track of the number of ribs I've broken on people while trying to bring them back from the dead.
I can also tell you that I've seen a lot of non-medically trained people harm or even kill other people they were TRYING to help by trying to do something WAY out of their scope of practice.
Through years of schooling, clinical and on the job training, I've learned how to deal with certain medical emergencies. Would I ever recommend that an untrained person attempt to intubate an unresponsive person? God no. In fact, in past educational capacities I've had, Ive actually had to explain to people that it is actually a very bad and dangerous idea to stab an unresponsive person in the neck and stick a straw in the hole to help them breathe.
Unfortunately because of the ease of access to medical journals and such thanks to the Internet, and the glamorization of an emergency tracheostomy in various shows and films, people have tried, and people have died.
Do you get what I mean? Just because something is hanging out of a lizards but doesn't mean that just ANYONE is qualified to pull that something out, even if they read an article about a vet doing it in an article someone cited on a forum.
Some things are just best left to the professionals.
You're correct in that a untrained person should not try to intubate a person; which is why health-care literacy is becoming a major concern. However, that is a totally different aspect than something hanging out of a persons/animals mouth and them possibly choking to death. I hope that you, or any other person on this forum, would not let their pet/friend/family die because they are chocking on something that is hanging out of their mouth and are not willing to pull it out because of fear it could do damage. Please; what would you recommend as an NP, what would you do? You're trying to argue against the wrong side here.
Edit: Also; if given the circumstances, I would still recommend an untrained person try to intubate, provide CPR, or the heimlich maneuver if the person is not going to make it otherwise. Atleast you are giving them a chance. (Knowing they will die otherwise is a different story).
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