New Rescue..need some help

bg77

bg77

New Member
Well to start off, I have been doing some research for quite sometime on chams, and still have too much to learn. My wife and I have been looking inot getting one for about a year, but just has not happened yet. We have bought a screen cage 24x24x48, 5.o UVB bulb, heat lamps, humidity/thermometer, and plants and vines to start getting ready. About a month or so ago we went to our local Petsmart to look at the new store,(My intention was to get a cham from a reputable breeder online) and pick-up some stuff for our daughters red-eared slider. While roaming around the wife saw they had 2 Veiled chams, and of course she wanted one know. I told her about the pros/cons of this. These gals were in a small aquarium display with a dripper, light, fake plant, bark on bottom and a bowl thing with water. I told my wife this was all wrong and that they would not make it. Well a month later they came to my wifes work(she works for a veternarian) and 1 was ok but the other was in bad shape. So the wife talked the manager into letting us adopt her. He agreed. So now I have a Female Veiled. I am tryimg not to panic, I really want this girl to survive. She is only approx. 4 inches or so from nose to base of tail. I have partioned the cage off, so it is approx. 24dx24wx12tall. My questions are.....

What is the max basking temp for one this small?
Should I feed her pinheads and flightless fruit flies?
How many times a day?
How often should I dust w/ Repcal calcium without d-3, and with d/3, and the herpivite?
Also at what approx. age should there be something for her to dig in?

Thanks for any help....
 
bg77 said:
What is the max basking temp for one this small?
Should I feed her pinheads and flightless fruit flies?
How many times a day?
How often should I dust w/ Repcal calcium without d-3, and with d/3, and the herpivite?
Also at what approx. age should there be something for her to dig in
Click to expand...

1) For Veiled Chameleon, the maximum basking temperature is mid to high 90 and the ambient day temperature around 80 +/- 5. Night time the temperature can be dropped from mid 60 to mid 70.

2) She is 4 inch long, pin head and flightless fruit flies will be sufficient.

3) I feed my baby chameleon once a day

4) I dust lightly on the feeder, if feeding with fruitflies... i dust almost 4-5 days a week since fruit flies can't be gutloaded. Cricket on the other hand, whe fully gut loaded with roach coach and feed with mixture of green, potato, sweet potato, carrott....i will dust once with calcium +D3, once with herpvite, and once with the mixture of both. So 3X a week. According to other people, if your cricket is very very well gut loaded, you don't even need to dust them. Given that the chameleon is exposed to natural sunlight and well hydrated...etc

5) Every female Veiled Chameleon matured at different age, some 6 months, some 8 months, some even take a year to matured. All depends on proper food intake, hydration and proper exposure to sunlight. You don't have to prepare anything for her to lay eggs unless she is showing signs of becoming gravid.... (increase food intake, very fiesty, showing gravid coloration, will stop eating for a few days when she is ready to lay eggs)
 
For 4" I would not go higher than 85-90 on the basking temp. Pinheads will work, but you could probably go a little bigger-not bigger thn the space between her eyes. When my female was that big she ate 10-15 1/4" crickets a day. About 5 months of age is good to put a laying container in for them.
 
Can you send us some pics? Aren't they grown up for fruit flies? I think mine aren't bigger than that and they already eat modest sized crickets...
F.
 
If she is 4" from snout to vent then she will need bigger crickets than pinheads. The crickets should be of a size that fits into her mouth comfortably. You don't want to overfeed a female veiled...it can lead to producing large clutches. (You don't want to starve her either so that she won't grow properly!)

Once a female veiled is older than 4 months, I would have an egglaying site in her cage. I use one that when empty, is big enough that the chameleon fits into it with a couple of inches to spare on all sides (including above). I fill it about 2/3rds full of washed playsand.

When/if she comes to digging in it....don't let her see you watching her when she is digging or she will abandon the hole. If it happens too often, it can lead to eggbinding.

Regarding supplements and UVB...
UVB is needed to allow the chameleon to produce vitamin D3 which in turn, allows the chameleon to use the calcium in its diet.

Most of the feeder insects we use have a poor ratio of calcium to phosphorous, so I dust the insects before feeding them to the chameleon with a phos.-free calcium powder.

I dust with a vitamin powder with a beta carotene source of vitamin A twice a month. Beta carotene won't build up in the veiled's system. There is controversy about whether chameleons can convert beta carotene to vitamin A or not...so some people give them a little preformed vitamin A from time to time. Preformed vitamin A can build up in the system and excess preformed can stop the D3 from doing its job thus lead to MBD.

Because my chameleons only get UVB from UVB tube lights, I also dust with a phos.-free calcium powder twice a month. D3 from SUPPLEMENTS can build up in the system so don't overdo it. D3 from exposure to UVB is regulated by the body and shouldn't lead to an overdose but the chameleon should be able to move in and out of exposure to the UVB light as well to ensure it.

With arboreal chameleons, I don't recommend a substrate. Too many of them lead to impaction.

Veileds will eat vegetation once they are 5 or so months old, so its important to use real plants in the cage that are non-toxic and have been well-washed (both sides of the leaves). They will also eat soil from the pot sometimes, so I usually cover it over since some of them can cause impaction if ingested.

Hope this helps!
Good luck with her!
 
Thanks for all the great info so far. I got the fruitflies because they said that is what they were feeding, I also bought some crickets. Well I took the flies back and got more crickets last night. I put 3 crickets in a cup last night and she went straight for them. Gobbled them up. She did not shoot for them, that I could see. I hope all is going well with her while I am at work, can't wait to get home.....

I will post pics soon

Thanks again
 
You said..."She did not shoot for them, that I could see."...do you mean that she doesn't seem to be able to shoot her tongue out?
Is she 4 inches in total length of from snout to vent?
 
3-4 inches from nose to vent. She just climbed in the cup, so I assumed that she did not shoot. She has not vitamins/calcium and not misted. This has been going on for a month or so. She looks skinny. Does not look any bigger than the day I first saw her. I sure hope she makes it.
 
Does she show any signs of MBD other than not shooting her tongue out....bent arms or legs, crooked casque, pliable jaw, inability to lift her body off the branches, etc.?

She may need a place to lay eggs since she is that big. If you don't provide a place and she is needing to lay some, it can lead to eggbinding.

Can you post a picture please?
 
Well she only ate 1 cricket yesturday....:( I have moved her basking temp up, because of her being sick, and hopefully that will increase her appetite. It now is right around 100. I am going to go and try to find some small meal worms or something today for her. She just is not eating well. She has had I think 7 crickets in 3 or 4 days. She curls her tail well and holds her body up good. But really worried here.
 
Too hot for basking for a 2" baby. You will cook her (dehydrate). She should be really no higher than 90.
 
Well we struggled for over a week to save this girl with no hope......She died today. My wife tried very hard but no luck. Thanks for all the help. I will be asking many more questions in the near future.

Thanks
 
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