New Owner, Upgraded Enclosure Questions

[Fullbackshak]

Hey all!

I recently came into possession of a female veiled who was not being taken care of very well. She was in a small glass enclosure with no lay bin, just a coiled UVB bulb, and grossly overfed without the proper calcium/d3/multivitamin routine. I've got her a lay bin (soil+sand with a live non-toxic plant in it) and just yesterday bought her a 2'x2'x4' screen enclosure. I've ziptied the vines I have across the screen to give her horizontal perches, and I put a foam "wall" (you can see at the bottom of the picture) to give her lay bin privacy, but the floor is bare besides that. I was just hoping for some insight on how to make her enclosure better. I've got a digital thermometer/humidity reader, a linear UVB bulb, a heat lamp and a coiled UVB bulb pointing at the same perch, a mister and a fogger. The next project I was planning is to cut a drain in the bottom of her enclosure.

I was thinking about getting a tall non-toxic plant to put in the bottom of her enclosure, and another vine or two to give her more paths to play on/get to her lay bin, but wanted to see if that would be the best idea for her. I'm open to pretty much anything to make this girl more comfortable!

Thanks in advance

 

[Ares05]

Hey!

So she needs more foliage. I would try and go for live plants instead of fake. Safe plant list: http://veiledchameleon.com/safe-plant-list

Your cage should be densely planted in some places, lightly in some places, and a bit bare towards the top.

More horizontal branches. You dont need to buy them. Just go outside and get some sticks of varying diameter. Avoid anything with sap. Rinse with a bit of soap, then pour boiling water over them, then cold, then boiling, then cold, then boiling, and dry.

Toss the coil uvb, but on the right track with the linear one. The only problem is it is quite short, you are going to want it to run the length of the cage. Reptisun 5.0 t5ho 22'' with a 24'' reflector fixture to fit it. For Arcadia you would want a 6% t5ho 22'', with a reflector fixture... I dont know much about Arcadia so if you would like to go down that route I am not the person to ask lol.

Your supplement schedule should be Plain calcium every day, calcium with d3 once every other week, and multivitamin once every other week (alternate) When you dust the feeders shouldn't look like a powdered donut, but should be a bit lighter in color.

Instead of the foam you can just wrap the bottom portion of the cage with an opaque shower curtain or something similar.

Your humidity should 30-40 in the day, 70-100 at night. you can use a fogger during the coolest hours of the night. Mist for 2-4 minutes in the morning and 2-4 minutes in the evening. Your temperatures should be 70 - mid 70 ambient and 80-83 basking. At night the cage can dip to high/low 60's

 

[Fullbackshak]

Hey!

So she needs more foliage. I would try and go for live plants instead of fake. Safe plant list: http://veiledchameleon.com/safe-plant-list

Your cage should be densely planted in some places, lightly in some places, and a bit bare towards the top.

More horizontal branches. You dont need to buy them. Just go outside and get some sticks of varying diameter. Avoid anything with sap. Rinse with a bit of soap, then pour boiling water over them, then cold, then boiling, then cold, then boiling, and dry.

Toss the coil uvb, but on the right track with the linear one. The only problem is it is quite short, you are going to want it to run the length of the cage. Reptisun 5.0 t5ho 22'' with a 24'' reflector fixture to fit it. For Arcadia you would want a 6% t5ho 22'', with a reflector fixture... I dont know much about Arcadia so if you would like to go down that route I am not the person to ask lol.

Your supplement schedule should be Plain calcium every day, calcium with d3 once every other week, and multivitamin once every other week (alternate) When you dust the feeders shouldn't look like a powdered donut, but should be a bit lighter in color.

Instead of the foam you can just wrap the bottom portion of the cage with an opaque shower curtain or something similar.

Your humidity should 30-40 in the day, 70-100 at night. you can use a fogger during the coolest hours of the night. Mist for 2-4 minutes in the morning and 2-4 minutes in the evening. Your temperatures should be 70 - mid 70 ambient and 80-83 basking. At night the cage can dip to high/low 60's

Thank you so much! Really appreciate it. I definitely will get her some live plants after work today.

How would you recommend attaching the branches to her mesh? I saw one comment that said just sticking thumbtacks on either end, but wasn't sure if that would be secure enough. I also have picture hanging wire I might be able to use. And I'll get her another light, I assume it couldn't hurt to keep her 12" UV-B up there as well? I was only planning on feeding her 5-7 crickets as big as her head is wide every other day, but I've been lightly dusting them with calcium every time I feed them, and doing the calcium/d3 and multivitamin as you've laid out.

I actually didn't know the humidity should be higher at night, but makes sense I suppose! I'll set the cycles to be more often/longer at night and change it in the morning to be a bit less during the day. Do you have any recommendations for making sure the humidity from the mister doesn't affect the wall near her cage? Or is angling it/putting plants in the way the only real solution.

Thank you again for typing that all out, me and her really appreciate it!

 

[Ares05]

What I did for my first round of setting up my boys cage was I wrapped wire around the end of the branch, and poked both ends of the wire through the mesh, and twisted the ends together, kind of acting like a twist tie.

You could also grab some wood lattice and secure it to the sides of your cage (on the inside) This will prevent screen climbing and make it easy to secure branches. You could also secure smaller plants higher up.

Or you could order some Dragon Ledges from Dragon Strand and secure plants and branches onto those.

For the wall, you can put a shower curtain up on the side the wall is on to block the water.

Dont run the mister at night, only during the day. For nighttime humidity use a fogger. Never use the fogger during the day. Heating + High humidity = RI

For lighting, yes you are correct, your linear fixture couldn't hurt! Keep using it until you can get a hold of a longer uvb. Remember, t5ho 5.0 (6% for Arcadia) . Dont get a t8, they are much weaker. Once you get the longer uvb, you dont need to use the 12''. Toss the coil as I said before, Its doing little to nothing.

I haven't personally dealt with an overweight cham, just seen them, but she for sure needs to lose weight. Because she had been overfed she probably will have a large clutch of eggs. For females, they are kept with lower temperatures and less feedings. This reduces clutch frequency and size, making it easier for them.

 

[Fullbackshak]

What I did for my first round of setting up my boys cage was I wrapped wire around the end of the branch, and poked both ends of the wire through the mesh, and twisted the ends together, kind of acting like a twist tie.

You could also grab some wood lattice and secure it to the sides of your cage (on the inside) This will prevent screen climbing and make it easy to secure branches. You could also secure smaller plants higher up.

Or you could order some Dragon Ledges from Dragon Strand and secure plants and branches onto those.

For the wall, you can put a shower curtain up on the side the wall is on to block the water.

Dont run the mister at night, only during the day. For nighttime humidity use a fogger. Never use the fogger during the day. Heating + High humidity = RI

For lighting, yes you are correct, your linear fixture couldn't hurt! Keep using it until you can get a hold of a longer uvb. Remember, t5ho 5.0 (6% for Arcadia) . Dont get a t8, they are much weaker. Once you get the longer uvb, you dont need to use the 12''. Toss the coil as I said before, Its doing little to nothing.

I haven't personally dealt with an overweight cham, just seen them, but she for sure needs to lose weight. Because she had been overfed she probably will have a large clutch of eggs. For females, they are kept with lower temperatures and less feedings. This reduces clutch frequency and size, making it easier for them.

Okay I will give that a go for getting more perches in her enclosure, thank you!

Good to know about the mister at night! So essentially I should run the mister for a minute or two a couple times during the day, then have the fogger going overnight? She just started her shed this morning so I want to make sure to make it as easy on her as possible.

Thanks for all your help, definitely going to make for a happier and healthier chameleon!

 

[Ares05]

Minimum two minutes, morning and evening. You shouldn't have to mist during the middle of the day, especially If you have live plants.

This my schedule : Uvb on at 7am, Mist at 7:30am for 3 minutes, Heat light on at 8am, put food in the feeding cup at 8:15am, take out food cup at 5:30pm, heat light off at 6pm, Mist at 6:30 for 4 minutes, uvb off at 7pm, fogger on from 11pm-4am, repeat. Everything except putting food in is automated with timers.

Do not mist her directly when she sheds. They are dry shedders. Getting them wet can actually make it harder.

No problem!

 

[Fullbackshak]

Minimum two minutes, morning and evening. You shouldn't have to mist during the middle of the day, especially If you have live plants.

This my schedule : Uvb on at 7am, Mist at 7:30am for 3 minutes, Heat light on at 8am, put food in the feeding cup at 8:15am, take out food cup at 5:30pm, heat light off at 6pm, Mist at 6:30 for 4 minutes, uvb off at 7pm, fogger on from 11pm-4am, repeat. Everything except putting food in is automated with timers.

Do not mist her directly when she sheds. They are dry shedders. Getting them wet can actually make it harder.

No problem!

Okay that makes a lot of sense! I've never seen that you shouldn't have their heat lamp on at the same time as misting, but I definitely will put that into practice now. Thanks again!

 

[Ares05]

I suppose you don't have to, but its just what I do. It also gives the enclosure time to dry off a bit before the heat light comes on, and to cool down before the evening misting.