Novice seeking food advice

[WAMBO]

Just got a healthy male Ambilobe yesterday. I was told he eats 1/2 inch crickets, but the local places have either tiny ones or bigger. He did eat 3 that look to be 5/8 to 3/4 inch, but I'm still nervous. I'll order the correct size on line, but should I run out and buy the smaller ones today? Or some super worms? And he's shedding right now, but just ate another this AM.

Thanks,

Bill

 

[jannb]

Welcome to the forums and congrats on your new chameleon. How old and how big is your boy? Any photos so we can tell the size? I always go with smaller feeders than to big especially when I buy a large quantity so they grow into the correct size. It's better to feed a smaller feeder than one that's to big and your cham could choke on it. It's best to feed a large variety of well gutloaded feeders. I'm attaching my blog for new keepers below.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blo...-with-young-veiled-or-panther-chameleons.325/

 

[WAMBO]

Thanks. He's 4 to 6 months. Body length looks around 4 inches [without tail].The small crickets are about 1/2 inch, but most are larger. I can feed him the smaller ones until I receive an order of 1/2 inch ones. He's almost done shedding. Right now, he's hiding in the Umbrella plant, so I can't photo him.

 

[Crashbandit05]

A good rule of thumb is the feeder shouldn't be bigger than the space between the cham's eyes.

 

[Andee]

If they are soft bodied feeders you have a bit of wiggle room with this rule but anything with a hard exoskeleton shouldn't be bigger than the space between. Sometimes you can get away with bigger if you have a good chewer but I only do it with adult chams. Ryker is my adult panther, he's rather small and but he always chews forever, so I sometimes feed him adult male dubias.

 

[WAMBO]

Thanks. He's eating them, but he eats when I'm not around to check if he's having a problem chewing them. I guess he 's fine. But I'm definitely ordering the 1/2 inch ones any way. These crickets are from Petsmart that I gut loaded them at home. I just don't want him to choke on the bigger ones, and most of them are big. The small ones at Petsmart were pinhead to 1/8 inch. I went there to purchase them since he was about to be shipped to me.

 

[Andee]

Yeah Petsmart doesn't separate their crickets well. I would definitely order the smaller ones to be on the safe side. ^^

 

[WAMBO]

He sure is a hungry fellow. Thanks everyone!

 

[WAMBO]

So now that I have smaller 1/2 inch crickets, I think that the remaining Petsmart crickets are too big. There could be 40 to 60 big ones left. What should I do with them? I don't want to release them into the wild because I'm not sure that I should be introducing a non-native species into the area.

 

[Andee]

You could just keep them until they die. They don't live very long at all.

 

[WAMBO]

Thanks!

 

[Chachi]

Also, a plus is you will get more calcium into him if he eats more crickets, and he eats more if they are smaller

 

[WAMBO]

He gobbled up 5 big ones from Petsmart [I gut loaded them of course] very quickly this morning. The 1/2 inch are much smaller. I may feed him as many of the smaller Petsmart ones that I can, and perhaps the teeny 1/2 inchers from Great Lakes Hornworm will get a little bigger as I gut load them. Thanks for the advice gang!