new 9 month old ambilobe panther chameleon past and new diet

[Sire Pascal]

Good evening everyone

i have a couple of concerns regarding my newly bought panther chameleon. He's 9 months old and about 6" from head to tip of tail. His previous owner bought him at 3 months and had only been feeding him 5 crickets a day. I saw a pic of a 11 month old chameleon and he looked a lot bigger and colorful. So should i be feeding him more then 5 crickets a day? and also how often should i be powdering the crickets with calcium and D3? I am gut loading them at the moment as well

thank you for any help regarding this. I am very concern

 

[jc31]

From my research 10-15 items a day is what your should be feeding at that age. Also a variety of feeders with either crickets or dubia s as the staple and various worms for "treats". Be sure to dust properly and gutload.

For example my 8 month old panther ate 10 large crickets, 1 med horn horm and 8 med dubias today. I gut loaded and dusted his multivitamin all with repashy products.

 

[Lpsouth1978]

IMO, you can feed him as much as he wants at that size. Normally at 9 months you might be starting to slow his food intake, but since he is so undersized, I would still offer as much as he will eat. He still has about 9 months of growing so he can still get a good deal larger.

As for your dusting schedule, it should be:

Every feeding with calcium without D3
2x a month with calcium with D3
2x a month with multivitamin

If he gets a lot of natural sunlight you do not need to dust with D3 at all.

Also, can you post pics of your guy?

 

[Lovereps]

Welcome to the forum!
You sound like a much more caring owner than the one he had before.
It is great that you want to know all you can for your cham's sake!

This Panther chameleon caresheet has plenty of info that you need to know about your new Pantherhttps://www.chameleonforums.com/care/caresheets/panther/

On the left side of the linked page are links to pages about other very important things to know to keep a cham healthy
This one will help you now to know how to give your cham the nutrients he needs https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/food/

Among the other important pages is this one about what seems to be a boring subject:lighting https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/lighting/
The reason it's important is because proper lighting and temperatures are necessary for chams to be healthy.
Without enough UV light a cham can develop MBD.
Every 6 months your cham needs a new UV bulb, so if the previous owner gave you his UV bulb, it should be replaced.
The bulb will look like it is perfectly fine but it stops giving off enough UV light
around 6 months.
Too low temps and chams don't absorb enough nutrients from their food. Too high is not good for their health either.

The information you were given in the posts before mine is also spot on--and everyone loves good pictures!

 

[Sire Pascal]

well thank you all so much for your information and help . I would love to post some pictures but every time i hit the upload button my page just goes blank?

 

[Lovereps]

You're very welcome.
The nice thing about this forum is that many people are helpful. We want you to know what you need to, so you can give your chameleon all the care he needs to be healthy and remain healthy.
The pictures can only be a certain size, sometimes it's easiest just to go to your user profile by clicking on your user name, (make sure you're in the statistics tab) and uploading the pictures to an album that you create.

Here is the link to how to post pictures https://www.chameleonforums.com/how-post-photos-video-3609/

 

[Sire Pascal]

thats my little guy

 

[Lovereps]

Aww, he's so cute!
He looks good.
If you follow the care guidelines for him and give him a variety of well-fed feeders he should do well in your care.

In the wild, chams eat a wide variety of insects every day, but the best we can do is to give them as much variety as possible and make sure those feeders have been fed a nutritious diet, so they give our chams the most nutrition possible.
Different feeders absorb more of some vitamins and minerals than others, which is one reason why variety is best.
Dubias, Phoenix worms, silkworms, blue bottle flies, isopods that are raised at home are just some of the different feeders your cham can have.

Often the commercial gutloads are low in many nutrients, so feeding the insects leafy greens and other vegetables is much better.
Here's some more info on that https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/food/
We use calcium and vitamin supplements, on the schedule that LPsouth1978 mentioned to ensure that our chams are getting enough of all the minerals and vitamins they need to be healthy.

 

[crazychamzoo]

Beautiful little Cham, but looks more like a female to me in the pic, just based on the nostral process not extending past the lips. But I'm assuming that's not a current photo, however if that is the current photo, I'm very doubtful he is 9 months old, I would guess 4-5 months old max if it's a male, and if the Cham is older than 5 months my guess is it's a she and not a he, looks a lot like some of our younger Ambanja or Nosy Be gals. A side profile pic of the Cham walking with its tail straight out will validate the sex.

 

[Lancecham]

I agree. If it is over 5 months, you have a girl.

 

[Sire Pascal]

Beautiful little Cham, but looks more like a female to me in the pic, just based on the nostral process not extending past the lips. But I'm assuming that's not a current photo, however if that is the current photo, I'm very doubtful he is 9 months old, I would guess 4-5 months old max if it's a male, and if the Cham is older than 5 months my guess is it's a she and not a he, looks a lot like some of our younger Ambanja or Nosy Be gals. A side profile pic of the Cham walking with its tail straight out will validate the sex.

I agree. If it is over 5 months, you have a girl.

Aww, he's so cute!
He looks good.
If you follow the care guidelines for him and give him a variety of well-fed feeders he should do well in your care.

In the wild, chams eat a wide variety of insects every day, but the best we can do is to give them as much variety as possible and make sure those feeders have been fed a nutritious diet, so they give our chams the most nutrition possible.
Different feeders absorb more of some vitamins and minerals than others, which is one reason why variety is best.
Dubias, Phoenix worms, silkworms, blue bottle flies, isopods that are raised at home are just some of the different feeders your cham can have.

Often the commercial gutloads are low in many nutrients, so feeding the insects leafy greens and other vegetables is much better.
Here's some more info on that https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/food/
We use calcium and vitamin supplements, on the schedule that LPsouth1978 mentioned to ensure that our chams are getting enough of all the minerals and vitamins they need to be healthy.

yea ill try to feed the insects veggies and fresh cut fruit instead of the commercial gut load... and am just going off what the previous owner told me. Although its clear to me now that he didn't know what he was speaking about. ill post a forum on the sex check page later today so i can better figure out if i have a son or daughter lol