Opinion required

[MissSkittles]

I set this up last week in a bit of a rush (patience is not one of my virtues). Still waiting for manzanita wood and few other things to arrive, branches to dry/bake in the sun and need to repot some plants. Besides giving lots of different roads for them to traverse, you want vines & branches of different circumferences to exercise their feet. They like lots of foliage to hide in. You want to be able to look in the enclosure and have to search for a few minutes to find your cham.

 

[kinyonga]

@Sbath if you answer the questions in the thread "how to ask for help" near the top of the health forum we can help you better.

 

[Sbath]

Chameleon Info:

Your Chameleon - I believe hes a panther after looking up different species, I was originally told he was a veiled (he is not) and his previous owner said he was a couple of years old. I've only had him for about 5 days now.

Handling - I haven't tried to pick him up at all at the moment, the farthest I've gone is hand feeding him. But everytime I put my hand into the tank I wear a glove as I'm hoping that won't stress him out too much.

Feeding - the next day I dumped in some crickets but the majority of them died he did eat a few. I have another bag but I cant put them anywheres so I'm just going to toss them as they too are dying. I'm suppose to be getting supply's soon so that will help. But I've been feeding him superworms lately so that I can feed him something. They're lightly dusted with the supplements as well.

Supplements - repcal herptivite multivitamins and repcal calcium with vitamin d3

Watering - We have a dripper at the back corner of the terrarium that we keep full and its dripping onto some leaves for him to drink from. I use to mist his terrarium a couple times a day but the ecoearth is too damp and the humidity is too high now so I'm going to work on removing the ecoearth and start misting the terrarium again.

Fecal Description - I think I've seen it it was brown in color and looked solid while mushy

History - the only thing I know that he gave me was that he had him for 6 months and he could be grumpy with new people

Cage Info:

Cage Type - glass with a mesh top. 18 x 18 x 24 (my mom and I are looking into a bigger one

Lighting - I have a 50 watt night basking light for him that's from zoo med. I dont know what light fixture it's in as I got it from the previous guy but I believe it's from exoterra. I dont know what type of uvb bulb is but its 13 watt. (My mom and I are looking into getting a linear reptisun one. And I have absolutely no idea what light fixture it's in...

Temperature - we didnt get a gauge from his previous owner so we had to do a lot of guess work. We do now have on and my mom and I are doing our best to keep it in the high 60s to low 80s range. At night it gets to low 60s. I'm unsure how high the basking area gets..

Humidity - having some trouble with humidity as we currently have ecoearth in the terrarium, getting rid of it tonight. But when we put the gauge in it was almost 100 percent. I was able to get it to about high 70s to low 80s.

Plants - we currently only have a couple of fake plants in there and vines with a branch of wood from petsmart

Placement - We had to do a quick table so the terrarium is on some boxes we had. It's not as high as I would like for him but were working on it. Theres a little bit of traffic that goes by his terrarium as it's in my bedroom. I don't really go back and forth but my mom does sometimes.

Location - new brunswick canada

 

[Coop]

Yeah, you definitely have a panther. How big is he? That could help determine age. For supplements, repashy plus Lod is good as an everyday supplement. Instead of just dumping the crickets into the cage, do you have somewhere other then the cage to contain them? Crickets at night, if not eaten, will bite. I just had to get my chameleon to the vet for some of those bites. If it is a juvenile, feed it 12-15 crickets a day, if an adult, 8 crickets every other day. Make sure to dust all of the food, and be careful with superworms. They are addicting to chameleons.

 

[Sbath]

Hes about 8 to 9 inches long before his tail and with his tail completely curled up hes about 10 to 11 inches. Not the foot before tail his previous owner said >.>

I dont have any other container for the crickets at the moment theyre in the mail and I should be getting them tomorrow or the day after. But I heard about the crickets biting him so I immediately went and fished out as many as I could find..
Ive also heard about the super worms being addictive so I've tried to be careful with how many I feed him... so I'm unfortunately definitely under feeding him ._. I feel so bad about that.....

 

[Kaizen]

Congrats on your new Cham! Welcome! Please stop using any lights at night, and pic up a t5 uvb as soon as you can.

 

[Sbath]

Congrats on your new Cham! Welcome! Please stop using any lights at night, and pic up a t5 uvb as soon as you can.

I have stopped using any lights at night, I was worri2d about how hot he would get with a day basking so I've been using the night one

 

[kinyonga]

Here's a link to one type of cricket keeper you can get...
https://www.lllreptile.com/products/2610-lees-large-cricket-keeper

In the meantime do you have a plastic container with a lid on it that you could use? The lid/container will need ventilation...screen or tiny holes that the crickets can't climb through though. Use egg cartons ripped in pieces or toilet paper tubes, etc for the time being to give the crickets a place to hide. Put the superworms in a separate "keeper". You can feed them both greens and veggies and a bit of fruit such as dandelion greens, kale, collards, endive, squash, sweet red pepper, sweet potato, apples, pear, berries, melon.

 

[Sbath]

Here's a link to one type of cricket keeper you can get...
https://www.lllreptile.com/products/2610-lees-large-cricket-keeper

In the meantime do you have a plastic container with a lid on it that you could use? The lid/container will need ventilation...screen or tiny holes that the crickets can't climb through though. Use egg cartons ripped in pieces or toilet paper tubes, etc for the time being to give the crickets a place to hide. Put the superworms in a separate "keeper". You can feed them both greens and veggies and a bit of fruit such as dandelion greens, kale, collards, endive, squash, sweet red pepper, sweet potato, apples, pear, berries, melon.

I talked with my mom about it and she found some small containers laying around that I'm allowed to use so that's good. Yeah I've been feeding the superworms some cucumber and clementines so I'm now just waiting for the stuff in the mail thank you for the advice about feeder insects

 

[kinyonga]

Just make sure they have lots of ventilation. Too much humidity will kill them.
Make sure you change the food often so it doesn't mold in the containers.

 

[Connorology]

I think there's been a lot of good information posted already. I would like to add: in terms of humidity gauges: the plastic circle analog ones that are sold for reptiles are almost universally junk and don't actually work. If you don't have one already, I would recommend an electronic one (they're inexpensive on Amazon, you can get ~6 of them for $12). Also, make sure it is hanging in the area where the chameleon actually is spending its time. The moist substrate might be 100% humidity, but really you're trying to judge the humidity of the air where the chameleon is.

Finally, the dripper and misting are critical to keeping your new friend hydrated. Make sure you keep it up! The enclosure you have is probably fine for now but long term you will need to upgrade to something larger. I am of the opinion hydration and watering are really critical. This might require you get creative with drainage methods, but you can't stop misting or dripping just because the substrate is wet, because it will decrease the opportunities for your chameleon to drink. The cheapest/easiest way to establish drainage in the short term would be to have the dripper dripping in a way where the water lands in a pan you can empty. Longer term it is worth trying to figure out how to set up the enclosure in a way where it just empties into a wastewater collection (bucket, jug, etc). I'd imagine there are plenty of posts about strategies on this website.

Good luck! You're on the right track so far.