Need help ASAP

[ChillaxinJacksonz]

Hi there I have raised Veiled Chameleons for a while now and this last spring I decided to take on breeding Jacksons. Just recently my gravid female had 14 neonates and they were all doing awesome for about two weeks. I have them in a 12x12x18 exoterra enclosure with a T5 light on top as well as a Exo Terra 60watt heat lamp that is 12" above the top of tank. I also have a Exo Terra 50watt nightlight on them. The humidity is around 60% and I have them in the bathroom so I run the shower a couple times a day to keep it kind of muggy for them. Temp is staying around 75 during the day at the bottom of tank and 68 during the night. Feeding the flightless fruit flies on the regular also misting up to 10 times a day with luke warm water. Have plastic vines in there for them to climb on. But as of this week six have passed away in less than 3 days. Ive read up on everything to see what could possibly go wrong and I know that have a very high mortality rate so I am expecting deaths, but if I am doing anything wrong will someone please give me some better advice cause I'm racking my brain on this and I don't want to see anymore parish. I understand that its always a risk in raising these awesome little guys but I would love for the rest of them reach adulthood. Hope to hear from someone soon. Thanks

 

[camimom]

What is the basking temp?
Babies like cool temps, if the bottom of the cage is 75, I would bet the top of the cage is over 80, which they don't like
this might explain your issue.

babies that age don't even really need a basking temperature.

Are you keeping a night light on all night> IF so, that isn't helping either. please remove that.

 

[ChillaxinJacksonz]

Your right the top of the tank just reaches 80 but it seems like the stronger healthier ones are staying to the top of the tank in the vines. And just wondering why I should take the night light off during the night it is only on for about 8 hours. Is there any disease that they can get that would kill that many that fast??

 

[camimom]

You want no lights at night, chams don't need light at night and they don't want it. it can keep them up.


there could be a disease, but most likely its one of a few things:

1. temps too high
2. mom wasn't healthy when she was Prego, and therefore had weak babies.
3. its a SIDS issue. (yes, Jackson's have sids issues)

 

[Djturna4thakidz]

Yes, they need total darkness at night. No night light

 

[laurie]

Just a few random thoughts that might help.

If you keep it muggy, is it drying out enough for the babies to eat the flies before they die?

You might take a couple out and put them in another container, think plastic shoebox, put a few fake greens in and take off the lights and foggers. Just mist the leaves and sides 4 or 5 times a day and see if that helps.

Have you tried pinhead crickets? I would think the flys are better, but I try any thing that might help.

Last, what is on the bottom of the exoterra? Anything they could ingest could be fatal.

 

[ChillaxinJacksonz]

You want no lights at night, chams don't need light at night and they don't want it. it can keep them up.


there could be a disease, but most likely its one of a few things:

1. temps too high
2. mom wasn't healthy when she was Prego, and therefore had weak babies.
3. its a SIDS issue. (yes, Jackson's have sids issues)

Thank you for the all the information, it has def helped me with the trouble shooting. This was my females first brood and I have the feeling that she had them premature cause she was in her sixth month of the nine if that holds any truth. Im not really sure when the magic number is for their full term. I have the temps down and it seems like it helping. On the sids note, how do they have issues with this. Also do you think that they could have a metabolic bone disease? If so when would be the proper time to start feeding them dusted insects I've seen people say a couple of weeks to a couple of months. As for the night light I have them on my adults and they seem to love it my female sleeps under them so I thought it would help with the little ones. On the bottom of the tank I have a zilla moss carpet that we take out and wash with hot water every other day. Thank you all for all the advice and information I really appreciate it and hopefully this will help the remaining have a fighting chance.

 

[camimom]

Thank you for the all the information, it has def helped me with the trouble shooting. This was my females first brood and I have the feeling that she had them premature cause she was in her sixth month of the nine if that holds any truth. Im not really sure when the magic number is for their full term. I have the temps down and it seems like it helping. On the sids note, how do they have issues with this. Also do you think that they could have a metabolic bone disease? If so when would be the proper time to start feeding them dusted insects I've seen people say a couple of weeks to a couple of months. As for the night light I have them on my adults and they seem to love it my female sleeps under them so I thought it would help with the little ones. On the bottom of the tank I have a zilla moss carpet that we take out and wash with hot water every other day. Thank you all for all the advice and information I really appreciate it and hopefully this will help the remaining have a fighting chance.

You really want no lights on at night. some chams can handle some light, others cant, its best to just have no light, and its not really needed. they like temp drops at night, and can handle temps down into the 50's so long as they can warm up during the day.

its not mbd, they cant develop it that fast. youd also see the broken limbs.

most likely, its just a weak clutch, either born to early, or the female didn't get what she needed while pregnant. it sucks, but it happens.

I would just remove the carpet completely, you don't really need it. and it can grow bacteria and mold, which isn't healthy for any cham, much less babies.

you said how do they have issues with this? do you mean isues with high temps?

Jacksons are montane species, so they are from cooler, wetter climates. when a dog gets to hot, it pants to cool down, when a cham gets too hot, it opens its mouth to thermoregulat. babies have a harder time doing this, so instead, they die. they simply over heat, just like when we get heat exhaustion (and nom they don't always just move away from the light when they get too warm).

I would start very very very lightly dusting pinhead crickets, and see if that helps as well.

 

[ChillaxinJacksonz]

The question I was asking about the issues with was the
SIDS statement. I was just wondering what can cause it? Also I dust my crickets
With a multi vitamin and a calcium D+3 supplement? Is there more is should be feeding
the adults? They seem to be picky eaters so crickets and millworms have been their
main diet

 

[camimom]

The question I was asking about the issues with was the
SIDS statement. I was just wondering what can cause it? Also I dust my crickets
With a multi vitamin and a calcium D+3 supplement? Is there more is should be feeding
the adults? They seem to be picky eaters so crickets and millworms have been their
main diet

Just like with human babies, we have no known reason for why SIDS happens when it comes to the chams either.

You shouldbe using a calcium with no d3. I don't know the exact schedule for jacksons, cuz I don't keep them, but read the care sheet posted on the forum and It will tel you.

in regards to feeding adults- you sholdnt feed mealworms al the time, they can be hard to digest when fed regularly and can cause impaction.

so, you can also feed:
silkworms
hornworms
dubia roaches

 

[Lovereps]

Hello.Sorry to hear of your baby Jackson's troubles.
I've raised over 50 Jackson's babies and did not experience the sudden death problem that so many others have reported.
While my "methods" may or may not make a difference to babies born to a malnourished or abused (recently imported) mother, it may help others to raise their Jackson's babies.
Having said this, I am not placing blame on Jackson's keepers for the sudden deaths they may experience.
Look at all the money which has been dedicated to researching human SIDS and the cause or causes still remain unknown.

Unfortunately, very little time or money is spent on researching chameleons and their health issues--which is why sharing information with others on this forum is so important.

Rather than keep secret what has worked for me, I'm glad to share the info and truly hope that it helps others to raise their Jackson's babies with fewer problems.


I'll clear up a misconception or two that you have and suggest a couple of changes.

First, Jackson's don't necessarily take 9 months to gestate before being born.
The range is 6-9 months and my Jackson's took 6 months from start of pregnancy to birth.
The babies were not premature and I did not have losses.
Baby Jackson's look odd compared to their older appearance. Their heads and eyes are larger and they are brown.
Every single one of my Jackson's xanth babies had 3 horn nubs present from birth.


Secondly, be prepared for the very strong possibility that momma Jackson will give birth to another set of babies 6 months from now.

Jackson's most definitely can and do retain sperm from a single breeding session and go on to have subsequent births.

For the setup, I would make a few changes.
I would eliminate both the basking light and the night light from the babies' enclosure.
They are both keeping the temperatures too high, which rapidly leads to dehydration in babies especially and the night light prevents proper sleep patterns in most chams.
Time and time again I've read posts by people who were advised when they bought their chams to use a night light--- and doing so resulted in their chams getting sick.
They were puzzled as to why, because they were doing everything they had been told (elsewhere) to do.

Jackson's babies like it cooler than the Jackson's adults do--who, in turn, like it cooler than Panthers and Veileds do.

Jackson's will benefit from a nighttime drop in temperature.
For this reason, I would get rid of mom's nightlight, too.

60-80% humidity is great but constant wetness isn't desirable. A humidity and temperature gauge is essential.
If you lower the temperature to 70-75 at the warmest, the babies will need less frequent mistings to keep the humidity up.

I used an 18x18x36" tall ExoTerra , put a used Reptisun 5.0 linear (long tube) bulb for UVB and warmth, added a couple of live Umbrella plants, lined the bottom with paper towels both to retain some moisture and to act as a replaceable bottom liner to ensure cleanliness.
I inserted 20-30 bamboo shish kebab skewers into the foam backing, so the babies could vary their distance from the UV and also quickly move anywhere within the terrarium that they wanted to go.

Food must be available constantly.
I loved using Josh's Frogs producing cultures of Hydei fruit flies and I also used their FF media to make my own cultures.
NEHerpetoculture also had nice cultures but does not have the quantities of producing cultures for immediate use that I needed to raise groups of 20-30 babies at a time.
I relied upon the nutrients present in the Hydei FFs from using cultures nourished with Josh's Frogs Fly media or Repashy FF media and did not dust the flies at all for at least the first month.

1 or 2 fresh pieces of fruit were kept on the end of skewers so that the flies would congregate there and make for easier targets for the babies.

They ate nothing but FFs for the first 4-6 weeks.
No D3 or multivitamin was added until later, as these were already present in the FF media.
That's why I was picky about which media I used for the FFs, too.
Some people make their own FF media from cheap ingredients but that is not going to provide the same nutrition as the Josh's Frogs or Repashy FF Media do.
I then added Phoenixworms because of their naturally high calcium content and they are also rather nutritious aside from the calcium.
I ordered them directly from the source http://www.phoenixworm.com/servlet/the-template/comparison/Page
I later added very small crickets and very small superworms--which both were always dusted with plain calcium to compensate for their poor calciumhosphorus ratio.
Hatching your own silkworms is another way to provide calcium rich feeders.




A variety of feeders is important for the adult Jackson's too.
Mine enjoy crickets, superworms, Phoenixworms, silkworms, isopods, land snails and Blue Bottle flies.
The feeders are all fed a nutritious diet, so that my chams are provided with more nutrients.
The reason that variety is good is that each feeder absorbs a different amount of the nutrients from the same foods.
For example, crickets store vitamin A in their eyes.
Land snails (you'll need to breed your own) store a huge amount of calcium in their shells. Isopods also contain a good amount of calcium, as do phoenixworms and silkworms.


Ensuring that everyone is drinking is an extremely important task.
Jackson's brains often don't seem to register the need to drink until after 2-3 minutes of continuous misting.
If misted in shorter bursts, some of them would not have been drinking enough.

I suspect that being unaware of this and failing to mist longer, rather than more frequently may be one of the common causes of Jackson's "SIDS".

I truly wish more people appreciated the Jackson's for the awesome chams that they are.

Gentle little, lovable dinosaurs is what they seem like to me!

I hope this helps you out and the rest of your babies thrive.


For anyone looking for a healthy Jackson's female--I am willing to let just a few go to good homes.
PM or email me before the weather gets too cold to ship safely.

 

[MeruJack]

WOW! THIS IS GREAT INFORMATION!! Thanks! I currently have five surprise Meru babies that appeared in their mother's enclosure just six weeks after I got her. She had five babies and, six weeks later, they are all still alive. I also have a Xanth that is five and a half months pregnant so finding your detailed info has come at a great time for me and my chams. Again, thanks!!!!

 

[johnnyev]

Yes agree, excellent information there. What forums like this should be all about.
Going to save this in my favourites, for when i eventually find a nice female j. jacksoni for my male. Hopefully i'll one day need it.

Thanks for sharing.