Rate my Veiled Chameleon Setup and Care!

[LaserGecko]

Hi everyone,

Please let me know what you think of this setup and if I'm doing anything wrong!

Background
I picked this up from a seller on craigslist for an incredible price about a week ago. He had her (I think, s/he hasn't cooperated when I've tried to look) for two years. The setup includes a 4'x2'x2' screen cage, one CHE, one basking lamp, one 18" flourescent UV-B fixture, a Habba Mist, a Little Dripper, and some cage modifications for the extra gear. It also had a giant water pan and Repti Bark with some big rocks for the bottom of the cage.

The chameleon seems to be very healthy. She will eat from my hand and directly from the CD cake box "bowl" that the previous owner made. I was using 3 week crickets, but my last batch of "slightly" larger crickets included a couple full grown ones. (Hence, the chirping in our house at night, but my wife actually likes it.) I was a bit concerned that they may be a little big for him, but he bit right through them. To keep from going broke, I'm going to get a thousand from The Cricket Factory next week. I'm feeding him about 15-20 crickets every other day.

Question #1: More? Less? Too big?

I know the "eyeballs" rule, but they aren't too much, if any bigger.

As the author of one of the most popular caresheets for uromastyx, I hear horror stories constantly about inadequate care so I am a hardliner about proper maintenance of captive herps. My attitude is "Do it right or don't do it at all! No excuses!" The caresheet was actually what tipped the scales in my favor for the seller. This is my first chameleon, but I've had my uro for 10+ years. Naturally, I made some changes to the cage when I saw things that didn't jive with the veiled caresheets.

The cage came with a tangle of Habba Branches in the top that were surrounded with a fake vine. While I didn't see any bites out of the leaves, I removed all of the fake plants to be on the safe side. I added an umbrella plant, small pothos, and something else to the now bare bottom of the cage. The new plant didn't fill up the cage as much as I intended and the top looked incredibly ugly with just those branches, so I replaced one small section of the fake stuff and it looks a ton better.

Question #2: What real plant can I use this high in the cage?

I haven't offered any greens yet because I didn't want to get her started eating them if there were fake ones in the cage.

Question #3: I still haven't seen her drink, but she looks healthy. Should I be worried? The Habba Mist (yes, I already want to replace that noisy POS) mists every hour for 15 seconds (or something like that).

Cage Environmental Factors
There are two ExoTerra guages and one Hagen strip on the cool end. The RH in the cage averages about 50%. The ceramic heat emitter maintains a basking spot of about 95-100°F when the basking lamp next to it is on. I just read that they really don't need additional heat unless the room gets cool at night. There's no AC in there, so I've turned it off along with the day lamps for the first time tonight. The cool side of the cage is about 70-75°F during the day.

Question #4: Should I do that or maintain the way she's been kept (CHE on at night)?

Question #5: Where should I put a laying box in this cage where there isn't really a good access to the floor? Should I add another branch going down to it?

That new plant really takes up a lot of room. I don't know if she could get down to the floor or not.

After removing the fake plants, she was brown for most of the day when she was on the branches.

Question #6: Was it chamoflage or was she pissed at the changes?

Question #6.5: Is that bulge under her chin an "attitude indicator"? She seemed to get a little annoyed that I was taking so many pictures.

Oddly enough, my entire family really digs her. There was a bit of resistance from my wife at first, but she loves the little slice of rainforest that's in our spa room now. Everyone's just amazed to watch him eat. Who knows? Perhaps there are a few panthers in my future, too!

Thanks in advance for any advice! This is my first "involved care" lizard and I want to do it right.

 

[Heika]

Question #1: More? Less? Too big?

That female is a big girl.. she can easily handle adult crickets. Personally, I wouldn't be feeding her more than 10 insects every other day, mainly because she is a bit chubby. She is also receptive.. see the blue in her? It is possible she will develop an infertile (or fertile, has she ever been exposed to a male?) clutch in the next few weeks.

Question #2: What real plant can I use this high in the cage?

You could add a hanging plant if you can find something to secure it to.

Question #3: I still haven't seen her drink, but she looks healthy. Should I be worried?

The Habba Mist is a pile of crap, but it looks like it has done alright by her. If she were mine, I would add a couple hand misting sessions a day in addition to the Habba Mist, mainly because you can mist longer by hand than the Habba Mist, and it will give her the opportunity to clean out her eyes and have a long drink. I don't think she looks dehydrated, though.

Question #4: Should I do that or maintain the way she's been kept (CHE on at night)?

I would get rid of the ceramic heat emittor. A nighttime drop in temp is healthy.

Question #5: Where should I put a laying box in this cage where there isn't really a good access to the floor? Should I add another branch going down to it?

Make sure it is easily accessible to her.. you don't want her to retain a clutch. I would add a branch going into the laying box.

Question #6: Was it chamoflage or was she pissed at the changes?

Stress from the change. Color change is most often an emotional response, not an attempt to camoflauge.

Question #6.5: Is that bulge under her chin an "attitude indicator"?

She seemed to get a little annoyed that I was taking so many pictures.

I think most of us would agree that chameleons really don't like cameras.. or much of anything, actually. "Attitude indicator" is a good description of the throat puff.

Watch out, chameleons are addictive.. pretty soon you will be making additions to your house to make space for all the cages..

She looks good. Nice straight limbs, definately well fed. I would replace the UVB light as soon as possible unless you have a receipt from the previous owner of when it was purchased. The UVB bulbs are only good for about 6 months. I am guessing you removed the water dish and the reptibark that the previous owner gave you?

 

[Tygerr]

Hey Jason

I find it amusing that in your post you refer to your cham as both 'he' and 'her'
From the pictures you posted, she certainly seems to be an adult female. She is a good-looking specimen.
Your cage also looks good.
It's great that you did so much research, and it's great that you've had lots of herp experience before getting one of the more "involved care" lizards.

Question #1: More? Less? Too big?
I know the "eyeballs" rule, but they aren't too much, if any bigger.

Adult chameleons can generally eat feeder insects that are larger than the standard rule. I wouldn't be too worried about her eating adult crickets.
As for the quantity, I might slow it down a bit. An abundance of food often triggers females to produce eggs (whether she has been mated or not), and every time she lays a clutch of eggs, it takes quite a toll on her body which could shorten her lifespan.

Question #2: What real plant can I use this high in the cage?

As soon as your pothos vine starts climbing up the side of the cage, it would be a great replacement for that fake vine you have at the top.
To get it going though, you could possibly suspend the pothos pot higher in the cage.
In my setups, I have brackets higher up in the cage in which I fit pots containing small Bougainvillea trees. You can train the Bougainvillea to grow out horizontally (they have creeper-like tendancies). I like them because they have solid woody stems so they offer climbing support, and my chams seem to like shedding by rubbing themselves against the Bougainvillea branches. They also seem to enjoy eating the leaves.

Question #3: I still haven't seen her drink, but she looks healthy. Should I be worried? The Habba Mist (yes, I already want to replace that noisy POS) mists every hour for 15 seconds (or something like that).

A good way to monitor her hydration is to examine the urates in her droppings. If the urates are white (not yellow or orange), then it is a good indicator that she is drinking enough.
You may not see her drinking, but she might be getting what she needs from the dripper when you are not around.
As for the Habba Mist though, 15 seconds at a time is not long enough in my opinion. You should try hand-misting her for a while to see how long it takes for her to settle under the spray of the water and to start drinking. It could take up to 15-20 minutes. I have my automated misting set to 20 minutes at a time, 3 times a day.
And remember that after a thorough misting, you also need to give the cage a long enough time to dry out properly. It shouldn't be wet all the time.

Question #4: Should I do that or maintain the way she's been kept (CHE on at night)?

I would think that you don't need the ceramic heater. Chams only respond to visible light as sources of heat anyway, so a basking lamp should be enough. 90-95F would be a good enough upper limit for her.
The ambient temps sound fine, and as long as your night time temps aren't dropping below 60F regularly, you don't need any heat sources at night.
I don't really trust the humidity readings on those ExoTerra analogue gauges (you might want to find a digital one), but 50% is a good average.

Question #5: Where should I put a laying box in this cage where there isn't really a good access to the floor? Should I add another branch going down to it?

I think you've answered your own question there. You need to make better access to the floor for her. Simply put, they go to ground to lay eggs. I don't think she would feel comfortable laying in a bucket suspended in the branches (although I've never heard of anyone trying this: maybe some have experimented with it). It doesn't seem natural.

Question #6: Was it chamoflage or was she pissed at the changes?

That's hard to say. Not all of their colour changes are related to mood. In a non-threatening environment, most of the colour change would be attributed to temperature (darker to absorb more heat, lighter to reflect heat). They don't change colour for camouflage - they let their natural patterns and colourations do that for them. But they do go darker when they are threatened, and can even go black to make themselves look less appetising to predators (like black, rotting carrion).

Question #6.5: Is that bulge under her chin an "attitude indicator"? She seemed to get a little annoyed that I was taking so many pictures.

Yes, that is a definite sign of "attitude". They puff themselves out to make themselves look much bigger when they are threatened (like when they have a camera lens poking around in their cage...).

The setup includes a 4'x2'x2' screen cage, one CHE, one basking lamp, one 18" flourescent UV-B fixture,

I'm sure you know this already from your experience with Uros, but just in case, those flourescent UVB bulbs need to be replaced every 6-12 months (or less if you can accurately measure their output with a UVB meter).


Good luck with your cham. She is a pretty girl. I'm sure you'll continue to be fascinated by her - they are amazing creatures.

In the time it took me to type all that up, Heika posted most of what I wanted to say... Ditto then.

 

[Marc10edora]

like Heika said, " the habba mist is a peice of crap". I have one and it didn't do much for my cham. I modified it to be an all day dripper for my cham. I increased the resevour and hooked it up to a timer to go off every ten minutes. Now it will spray for about 30 secs every ten minutes a day. The new resevour that I made makes it last for 7 days. Even though I have this running all day, I still mist the cage three times a day.

 

[LaserGecko]

Thanks everyone! I was dead tired last night after my first day of rescue dive class, so there were a few typos and I forgot to mention the hand misting I do. Normally, I work nights but I'm on days for that class this week so she didn't get any misting yesterday.

I didn't take a full length shot, but the cage is on a 2' high deck, so the top is at about 6'. Luckily, the best place for her for us was actually the best place for her.

Personally, I wouldn't be feeding her more than 10 insects every other day, mainly because she is a bit chubby. She is also receptive.. see the blue in her?

Cool, Heika! I bumped up her feeding a bit because when I was doing the half inch crickets, I saw some ribs when she was walking. I hadn't even looked into the breeding part of it since I wasn't completely sure yet about the husbandry.

Think I should take her over to Tyler's for a little conjugal visit with one of his males? If she's going to clutch anyway... I will check with the former owner, but he didn't have any other chameleons and never mentioned trying to breed her.


Tygerr, I will keep an eye out for a Bougainvillea. I've always liked those, anyway.

I will keep more of an eye out for the poop. That plant takes up so much room in there that I haven't seen any lately. Early on, I did learn the horrible thing that can happen if they poop into a moist container (the "mist" nozzle was too close to the food container). Geeez, I would almost rather change a dirty diaper than deal with that smell. Pee-yew!


I just got over worrying about the orchid bark and fake leaves (that I replaced, if it wasn't clear in my first post) and now I get to spend all day worrying about getting an egg container in there. Ironically, we have a week old grand daughter that we've been watching for a couple of days while our daughter went back in the hospital for a kidney infection. Somehow that all seems under control (probably since we know what we're doing with babies) and I'm worrying about this lizard.

BTW, not that I'm interested in selling her at all, but what's she worth at this age and health? I'd like to know so I can rate how good of a deal I got.

Thanks again for the time involved in replying! I know how long it takes to give a good bit of advice.

 

[Julirs]

The cage alone will run you about $110-$120, and all of the supplies another $75 with the lighting, bulbs, dripper, etc. Most people are not selling 2 year old females, however you an get female Veileds commonly for $60.00.

 

[Tygerr]

If she's going to clutch anyway...

She might not develop a clutch. Kinyonga has managed to raise many female veileds who have never had a clutch by careful management of the food and heat.
But she certainly seems old enough and healthy enough to let her breed, if that's the way you want to go.
Either way, the egg-laying container is a must. There was a post yesterday from someone who didn't put in an egg-container and the chameleon nevertheless laid eggs on the bare cage floor. That was actually lucky: it could have been worse. Without an egg-laying container they sometimes just don't lay and then become egg-bound, which would require surgery to solve.

Geeez, I would almost rather change a dirty diaper than deal with that smell. Pee-yew!

If I were you, I'd take a some of her droppings to a vet and have him perform a fecal float to test for parasites. It's a good thing to do any time you get a new reptile, but in your case even more so, since one of the common indicators of parasites is overly odourous droppings.
If there are parasites, it's usually a fairly simple procedure of prescribing the right medicine and dosage to get rid of them.
If not, at least you'll have peace of mind - of course the smelly poop will still be there though
Parasites are quite common, even in CB animals. Sometimes they get them from their feeder insects (especially bugs collected from the wild).

 

[LaserGecko]

since one of the common indicators of parasites is overly odourous droppings.

I think it had more to do with the fact that she pooped right in the food container and the poop sat in a couple tablespoons of water for awhile. That was the only time I noticed it.

I will definitely check into it, though. There's actually a petstore here in town that does that to all of their animals as part of their routine care. (When's the last time you saw a microscope at a petstore?) I might see if they can take a look at it, just to get an idea of the urgency required. Obviously, they're not vets, but they do know their...well...you know.

It would be nice to have an educated guess ahead of time.


One cool thing about taking these photos: I had never noticed the blue until Heika mentioned it. It is either more pronounced A) because of the photograph or B) because she was agitated. It's a lot more subtle in real life.

Very interesting.


One other question:
Does chameleon care get to a point where once you have the environment under control, it's fairly routine? One of the reasons I recommend uromastyx as a first time lizard is that the husbandry is very easy once the housing is within specs.

I hope that makes sense; I think I'm still in a bit of "chasing my own tail" mode right now.

 

[LaserGecko]

What about mealworms for a girl this size?

I want to vary her diet, but not bind her up with chitin, either. The petstore only had tee-iny ones and super sized mealies, so I opted for the supers.

I found a black one in the cup. Is it dead/bad? They're warming up from the fridge, but none of them are moving right now.

 

[Vibrant Chameleons]

That setup looks nice and the chameleon is even better. Shes a beauty!

 

[Julirs]

Superworms are great-much better than mealies. I don't keep them in the fridge and yes black ones are dead ones.

 

[Ashaby]

I've found with my adult female that once you have a balance in the viv, it's fairly routine. It may just be with my chameleon, (she is my first) but when the lights go off, she climbs a vine or the back wall and goes to sleep, she feeds around the same time each day and usually wakes up around the same time. I have a large exo-terra glass viv with a very tight-knit wire mesh for the roof with access hatches, so the temperature may vary throughout the day by a degree or two as it's ventilated, but this doesn't bother my chameleon at all.

The best advice I ever got in a local pet shop when I asked if I was doing it right was when the pet shop owner asked how long I'd had her. I said about a year, his reply was, "Keep doing exactly what you're doing then."

Don't go mad if you decide to feed yours wax worms as they have a very high fat content and can cause your chameleon to become over weight or obease. It's good to vary their diet, I feed mine dusted Brocolli usually once a week to give her iron and calcium intake.

Make sure you clean droppings out regularly!

 

[carol5208]

I've found with my adult female that once you have a balance in the viv, it's fairly routine. It may just be with my chameleon, (she is my first) but when the lights go off, she climbs a vine or the back wall and goes to sleep, she feeds around the same time each day and usually wakes up around the same time. I have a large exo-terra glass viv with a very tight-knit wire mesh for the roof with access hatches, so the temperature may vary throughout the day by a degree or two as it's ventilated, but this doesn't bother my chameleon at all.

The best advice I ever got in a local pet shop when I asked if I was doing it right was when the pet shop owner asked how long I'd had her. I said about a year, his reply was, "Keep doing exactly what you're doing then."

Don't go mad if you decide to feed yours wax worms as they have a very high fat content and can cause your chameleon to become over weight or obease. It's good to vary their diet, I feed mine dusted Brocolli usually once a week to give her iron and calcium intake.

Make sure you clean droppings out regularly!

This thread is 4 years old!

 

[Ashaby]

Oops, ha ha. I've only just joined today.