panther chameleon right eye closed

[Adashek123]

eleon Info:
Your Chameleon - Panther Chameleon, male, 13 months, 9 days

Handling - 5 times so far. he crawled on me twice while doing maintnence

Feeding - aiming at 5 Superworms daily, until i get my silk and horn worms. he doesnt wanna eat crickets. gutloaded with vegtables and whatever the store uses
Supplements - rep-cal calcium without d3 everyother feeding, rep-cal herptivite twice a month and calcium with d3 once a month

Watering - Mist cage 4 times a day for 3 min at a time, leave dripper in morning and evening. i dont see him drinking from drippers. only when i mist his cage

Fecal Description - heres a link to the picture: https://www.chameleonforums.com/orange-poo-83185/

History - bought from a friend. hes been fine with him

Cage Type - 4 foot by 2 foot by 2 foot screen cage with mesh top.

Lighting - 5.0 repti glo uvb fixture and 60 watt daytime heat bulb

Temperature: basking: 90 - 95 everywhere else in cage : 75 average
night time temp : 60-75

Humidity - 40-80 percent. I mist and i live in florida so humidity is not hard to keep constant

Plants - umbrella plant

Placement - cage is on a stand about 3 feet off the ground. its in my room, near one fan but the fan is barley on. i go through my room about 5 times a day but he cant see me because of a towel on one side of his cage

Location - florida. tampa

Current Problem - has been keeping his right eye shut since yestarday morning, after a misting session. i took him out of his cage yestarday and the eye opened up again, but once i put him back he closes it right up. for the past hour, he is just laying there while basking, closing both eyes sometimes? he just ate though so i know hes fine, but i am just worried about the eye. i dont know if i should shower him plus i dont know how to do it

 

[DrRhymes]

Could you post some pictures? I could be a vitamin a deficiency but you seem to have the correct supplements.

 

[Djturna4thakidz]

Maybe try a more substantial gutload. Bug burger is what I use as a basic staple. There are some really good blogs on here regarding gut loading. That may help

 

[ataraxia]

Based on your care parameters. He could be closing his eyes for a couple of reasons.

1. Hydration: From your description it sound like your giving enough water but your fecal description (picture) does not support it. You are going to have to either A. Truly mist for 3-5 minutes, 3 times a day with a dripper or B. You are going ti have to do it for longer with your guy.

2. Vit A: Some panther dont do well with herptivite as a multivitamin. these panthers need a multivitamin with a preformed source of vit A instead of proformed versions found in herptivite. A product like reptivite or cal plus should be used in place of the herptivite. To get his levels back on track, you may need to get some cod liver fish oil gel capsules. they can be found in any health section of most stores. Smear the back of ONE cricket with the oil. If he is showing no improvement, try this a total of three different time. DONT OVER DUE IT YOU CAN CAUSE HARM. Just one feeder at each feeding.

What style type uvb do you have?

We need a current picture of the eye closed. This will help explain more than words.

 

[Adashek123]

ataraxia: wait, so your saying by his poop (pics), that he is dehydrated? how can you telll? because people are telling me that the orange in his poop is from superworms. he seems to be addicted to them. no more for him, i probably wont feed superworms for a few days or longer. even if i have to starve him for 2 days (he doesnt even poop everyday), i will change his diet up. i will try to look for a better multivitamin supplement like repashy. i herd that one is really good, and i use a repti glo 5.0 uvb light thats 18 inches and a 60 watt daytime reptile tropical basking bulb. i will post pics of the eye, but honestly, it only looks like a regular closed eye from a sleeping chameleon. it doesnt look weird or anything. just kind of sunken, and closed, but looks exactly like any chameleons eye when they sleep. when i handled him this morning to give him a shower ( i was told to do so), he opened both eyes up and they looked normal and nothing was in them. i showered him on a fake plant for about 5 mins and it was not a direct shower. the water was pouring over him and the plant, and he was just getting some mist and water droplets.

 

[ataraxia]

Hi, yes your boys urate shows he is has not received enough hydro. It could be that the silk plants are absorbing the water versus leaving droplets for the animals to drink from or it could be a variety of different things. Either way, your goal is to try to have a solid white urate. However you achieve that will depend on your techniques and your individual animal.

I would try the cod liver oil...


Heres some read about super worms being abused/

This person had problems with only using super worms. You can read from this post forward.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/one-month-hunger-strike-help-100971/index2.html#post929223

Heres another.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/sigh-evils-superworms-91486/

Another.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/2-weeks-hunger-strike-88263/

 

[laurie]

Just a question, how long have you been using his uvb bulb? They are usually changed after 6 months as the amount of uvb produced degrades, even though the light is still working fine.

 

[Adashek123]

UPDATE: both eyes have now been oppen after a long, hot shower.


ataraxia: i dont use ANY fake plants in my enclousure. Only vines and one huge umbrella plant.. they stay moist for a while. but i seriously drip water over his nose daily and he drinks it... so to me it seems like hes hydrated, but if not, then jesus he is either to shy to drink alot or just doesnt wanna. i put him in the shower on a different plant that is fake (i cleaned it well before use) and i turned on the water. the water never hit him directly, as it was pretty warm. the whole bathroom fogged up and i had him in theere for a good 5-10 min. he climbed to the top of the bamboo stick in the fake plant, which is closest to the shower head. he then just sat there, with his hands up as if he was praying and had his eyes closed.. his colors flared up super nice and seemed to enjoy it, but didnt really drink much in the shower i dont think. maybe if i left him in there for longer. but i just pulled out the bamboo stick with him on it, placed him in his cage and he has both eyes open. he just went to sleep about 5 minutes ago in his sleeping spot, but they both look the same size now atleast. maybe his eye was dehydrated!!!!! BTW. his eye started closing yestarday morning, after a direct misting session. he drank some water then too.

laurie: the bulb is literally 7 days old. i bought it right before i got him. this wouldnt be from uvb defficiency though

 

[ataraxia]

I do have a suggestion for you. Set your misting to about 1 minute. Leave it off for another couple minutes and turn it back on for the drinking session. They truly dont need three long sessions a day. One in the morning or afternoon is what i person shoot for. Something like 10-15 minutes long with the other two sessions last right around 5 minutes. See if this doesnt help your guy.

If it is a vit A deficiency i urge you to try what i have already stated to help your guy out.

 

[Adashek123]

i will try. hes still keeping his eye closeed as of 5 min ago even gave him a shower. he opened it up for about 10 min todal and looked completely normal but now its shut again

 

[gacpro]

Adasheck123,

I recently has a similar issue with a WC Male Nosy Me that I purchased from one of this site's sponsors. Thinking I didn't have any thing to worry about, I did not take him to the Vet right away. After about a month, he wouldn't open one of his eyes. I tried the fish oil supplementation for about 5-8 days with no improvement. I finally decided to take him to the Vet. They discovered he was heavily infested with parasites. Started treatment immediately. Am happy to report he now has both eyes wide open and is no longer lethargic. In fact tonight he was fired up and ready to mate when exposed to a receptive female. So glad I took him to the Vet.

 

[ataraxia]

Have you tried the vit A treatment yet?

 

[Adashek123]

i stilll need to get the gel capsules. but he is deffinetly a good eater. havent fed him superworms for a full 3 days, only crickets. he is eating them fine so i guess he never really got addicted to the superworms. i dont think he has parasites, but i will get a fecal done when he poops. he hasnt pooped since the last one i posted a picture of which was about 4 days ago??? kinda weird. he wasnt eating too much before, when i first got him which was last 2 saturdays ago. no crickets and a few worms a day after the first 3 days i had him. but just yestarday he started eating the crickets i hand fed through the mesh top. i completely stopped feeding him the dumb superworms a few days ago. never again. and im ordering silkies and hornworms. i really do think i will get a fecal done, i am not ready to drop money on a vet visit for no reason. i understand it would help though and if i had the extra cash i would take him. i need to find a herp in the tampa/saint pete area though. what should i do besides the gel capsules??? i gave him a good amount of herpivite a few days ago on his food. should i keep giving him the warm showers? he doesnt seem to mind them, but freaks out sometimes. i let the water run warm/kinda hot but it doesnt ever hit him directly, only makes mist and makes it super humid in the bathroom. i have a huge ficus in my shower for him. btw im kinda nervous about the vitamin a gel capsules or whatever because i herd vitamin a can be toxic at high levels and different brands of capsules might have more or less or it.

 

[gacpro]

Understand about spending money needlessly at the Vet. I never suspected that my Nosy be would have parasites because I figured coming from a site sponsor, it must be in good health. Well lesson learned! I too was concerned about the fish oil/ vit A treatment. I read the thread Jim Fleherty ( The Chameleon Company) posted awhile back and decided to try it. After a week without results I decided it was time to see the vet. Surprise! Parasites were in abundance. Was given treatment and eye drops. He is recovering nicely. Oh and he now gets the Repashy Calcium Plus with Vitamin A

 

[Adashek123]

yeah i am getting repushy calcium with vitamin a and im getting the superpig gutload or whatever. i WILL take him to the vet but only if hes poop shows parasites when i get a fecal done. im still trying to find a reptile vet in the area. but thats great that your cham is recovering. im giving mine a shower and his eye opens after but closes shortly after and is somewhat smaller. he pooped and it looked completely normal (one large brown poop and a whitish urate). btw how much did it cost u for treatment? thank u

 

[gacpro]

The vet bill was $65 for the exam and treatment for parasites. I'm now using a Vet in the Valrico area.