Poop Question

Tbrock91

Tbrock91

New Member
I have a male 3 month old Veiled Chameleon that I purchased last Thursday. I have found your post excellent and informative. I have read the very informative post by "ferretinmyshoes" to paraphrase what she said that the frequency depends on how old the chameleon is and other factors. One of my questions is, what is "young" for Chameleons? Like I said he is 3 months old his diet right now is gut loaded 5-6 small crickets every other day and then the days that I don't feed him crickets I feed him gut loaded 7-8 small mealworms. I dust all of his food with Zoo Med Repti Calcium with With D3 (3 oz) powder and every day he gets fresh fruits and veggies. He has a basking lamp and UVB light that I turn on in the morning and then at night when we go to bed, so he gets around 12-14 hours of heat lamp and UVB. His enclosure is s screened Repti Breeze 16 x 16 x 30 I hold him no more than 3 times a day each time for around 30 minutes. He passed a urate sometime yesterday (Monday) but no feces. I know I am telling you a lot but I just wanted to make sure I am not missing anything and to see if it is normal for him not to have passed any stool.

Poop 101 by ferretinmyshoes
 
Please do not dust crickets with the calcium D3 every day !!!!' Twice a month he should get calcium with d3 and a multivitamin. The rest of the times if alternate one day on one day off with calcium NO D3!!! That can really harm him, also I would feed little man every day 6-10 small crickets since he is growing right now it is essential that he gets the food and correct suplimentation. Poop wise should be every day to every other day depending how active or how much basking he has been doing but I do not recommend D3 every feeding , as others will tell you just get a calcium supplement w/o d3 for regular feedings !
 
Yes, that is wayyyy too much D3. too much D3 can do way more harm than good. Cut the D3 down to twice a month, and get plain calcium with no D3 or phosphorus for every day use. Too much D3 can actually cause symptoms that mirror MBD.
 
Ok I will cut back on the D3 and get supplements and calcium without D3. Do you think I could bump him up to big crickets?
 
And just for the record I assumed that the Zoo Med Calcium with D3 was just regular Calcium powder. So my bad:(... I will fix that:)
 
That's good and also use a multi vitamin like sticky tongue indoor minarall ect and try feeding daily till he is full grown :) a 1/2 inch cricket would be the max I eould feed him ( rule of thumb don't use feeders wider than the width between his/her eyes :)
 
DirtyDubbz said:
That's good and also use a multi vitamin like sticky tongue indoor minarall ect and try feeding daily till he is full grown :) a 1/2 inch cricket would be the max I eould feed him ( rule of thumb don't use feeders wider than the width between his/her eyes :)
Click to expand...

Sticky tongues Minerall is not a multivitamin, it is a calcium powder. The outdoor version is plain calcium without D3 while the indoor version does contain D3, it does include minerals, but that is not a multivitamin. If you do get a multivitmain that contains D3, you will want to use it no more than twice a month. Be sure to gutload your feeders with fresh veggies, greens and fruits. You can also make a good dry gutload mix with nuts etc. Or purchase the commercial brands. Here is a good link to many blogs on gutloading.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/sandrachameleon/nutritional-information/

And of course the care sheets

https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/caresheets/

Handling him 3 times a day seems excessive. They can stress easily. Also you will need a much larger cage in the near future. Can you post pics of your set up?

At his age he should eat daily, I would feed as much as he can consume in around 5-10 minutes. They can eat quite a bit at that age. 5-6 crickets doesnt seem like enough.

You can also check out our site sponsors for a wide variety of feeders, he will apprecite it.
 
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full

This is Eli's setup. The plant to the right is a Dracaena Marginata and the two plants on the left are fake. The silver lamp is a heat lamp and the black one is UVB.

And I do plan on building him a bigger cage when that time comes.
 
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I would suggest removing the substrate at the bottom as he could ingest it and become impacted. Also you should add many more horizontal vines at various levels throughout the cage. This way he can have more pathways for walking as well as various levels for thermoregulation.
 
pigglett79 said:
I would suggest removing the substrate at the bottom as he could ingest it and become impacted. Also you should add many more horizontal vines at various levels throughout the cage. This way he can have more pathways for walking as well as various levels for thermoregulation.
Click to expand...

The substrate that I got said it was ok for Chameleons I had before with my female Veiled and she never became impacted, she pooped all the time. The suggestions about the vines I will take thanks
 
pigglett79 said:
I would suggest removing the substrate at the bottom as he could ingest it and become impacted. Also you should add many more horizontal vines at various levels throughout the cage. This way he can have more pathways for walking as well as various levels for thermoregulation.
Click to expand...

I agree with both these suggestions.
 
Do not use substrate. If they see a cricket down there and shoot for it, they could very easily ingest it with the cricket, causing impactions and other GI problems. Plus, it holds moisture and doesn't completely dry out, which becomes a breeding ground for bacteria that can make them very sick. Do not use anything on the bottom. Paper towels if you must. Since chams never hang out on the ground, they don't need the ground to be all fancy for them. If anything, set up a draining system at the bottom to get rid of the pooling water.

If the pet store told you to get substrate it's because they don't really know about chams, shouldn't be trusted, and want you to spend more money with them by buying stuff you don't actually need.
 
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