Stopped eating after mating.

[Eyal]

Hi all, my chams were mated 8th of october.
She seems to stopped eating , and its VERY early already so i cant be egg delivery. Im using crickets for feeding and he is ignoring them, they can get tired of feeders right?
Im located in Sweden and i've been looking for hornworms here but none is breeding them.
Other feeders we got is Zoophobas, Cockroaches...mealworms but i wont feed mealworms to her.
Is zoophobas better?
Do they limit their food supply when gravid?

 

[chameleonneeds]

Dont know about her stoped eating early but now during the time of egg developement, the more you feed her and have high tempreatures the more eggs she will develope and lay but it is better to feed less to have an average of 20-35 eggs so feed her less and supplement nearly every feeding with calcium powder with out d3 if her clutch is large she will be extremely weak and after a few more clutches she can die, so the more clutches basicly takes abit of her life, thats why males live longer than females.

Good luck.

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

Hi all, my chams were mated 8th of october.
She seems to stopped eating , and its VERY early already so i cant be egg delivery. Im using crickets for feeding and he is ignoring them, they can get tired of feeders right?
Im located in Sweden and i've been looking for hornworms here but none is breeding them.
Other feeders we got is Zoophobas, Cockroaches...mealworms but i wont feed mealworms to her.
Is zoophobas better?
Do they limit their food supply when gravid?

zoophobas are great = AKA Superworms. Very good for them and a good sub for crickets.

 

[kinyonga]

Can you post a picture of her?

 

[Eyal]

zoophobas are great = AKA Superworms. Very good for them and a good sub for crickets.

All right! I didnt know they were good. Thought superworms were a bad diet for chams.. well good then, i will begin to gutload them.


How to breed them?

 

[Eyal]

Can you post a picture of her?

Yepp, first thing i will do when i come home from school.

 

[Eyal]

Here she is!

I mean she doesnt seem under weight..

Its soo cute. i can see a small bump just at the end of her stomach, guess thats an egg

She is 7 days pregnant haha xD

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

I am having a similar problem. My female panther is a pig. After she mated I havn't seen her eat anything.

She was mated on 10/8/2008 as well.

 

[Cainschams]

Dont know about her stoped eating early but now during the time of egg developement, the more you feed her and have high tempreatures the more eggs she will develope and lay but it is better to feed less to have an average of 20-35 eggs so feed her less and supplement nearly every feeding with calcium powder with out d3 if her clutch is large she will be extremely weak and after a few more clutches she can die, so the more clutches basicly takes abit of her life, thats why males live longer than females.

Good luck.

The egg count is predetermined BEFORE she is mated. This is why we put them on a strict diet. It is now when you want to feed her and bulk her up and supplement a little more with calcium because she will need the extra nutirents to produce the eggs and lay. After she lays you want to feed her good for a few more days and then cut back on the feeding. Chameleonneeds is right about the more eggs the more taxing it is on a female. The general rule is to only mate 1 time a year which they can produce more than 1 fertile clutch over the course of a few months. I had 3 fertile clutches from 1 mating all which have hatched. She laid te first clutch then 1-2 months later the second and 1-2 the third. You do see fewer hatchlings come out of the retained clutches. I hope your female starts eating and lays with no problems. GOOD LUCK.

I just noticed you had veileds. My 1 time experience is with panthers. Kinyonga has an article on raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.something. Sorry, about her experiences with veileds. She can get them to lay only 1 clutch after being mated and never lay a clutch if a virgin. If you havent read the article I would suggest you do.

 

[SoCaliSon]

How are you feeding her? Hand Feed? Free Range? I would try leaving a cup of food in the back corner... or somewhere where she can eat it and feel as secure as possible, Make sure the feeders cant escape so that you can monitor if she ahs eaten any. I have a female that would sit on my hand and eat... But once she became gravid she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me. I couldn't hand feed her, and just my presence seemed to freak her out. I feel it is normal for them to become more standoffish while gravid, see if she we eat in private.

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

How are you feeding her? Hand Feed? Free Range? I would try leaving a cup of food in the back corner... or somewhere where she can eat it and feel as secure as possible, Make sure the feeders cant escape so that you can monitor if she ahs eaten any. I have a female that would sit on my hand and eat... But once she became gravid she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me. I couldn't hand feed her, and just my presence seemed to freak her out. I feel it is normal for them to become more standoffish while gravid, see if she we eat in private.

Great advise Joe, Thanks! I am going to get out theold milk jug feeder cup. What you are describing is exactly what I am seeing.

 

[Eyal]

How are you feeding her? Hand Feed? Free Range?
.

I'm cup feeding, and she loves the shedding crickets some how.. she takes em straight away, and she took some supers today. I think its all going to be fine. Guess cause shes gravid then.

 

[Eyal]

I just noticed you had veileds. My 1 time experience is with panthers. Kinyonga has an article on raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.something. Sorry, about her experiences with veileds. She can get them to lay only 1 clutch after being mated and never lay a clutch if a virgin. If you havent read the article I would suggest you do.

If i get that english right, you say that veileds are hard to get fertile eggs when mated the first time?
OR?

 

[BocaJan]

Both my females were mated for the first time in August and both bore healthy clutches in September. Clutches averaged 32 eggs each.

 

[Eyal]

Both my females were mated for the first time in August and both bore healthy clutches in September. Clutches averaged 32 eggs each.

Ok, thank god.. Well the risk is always there though.
Thank you all for giving me tips and answers!!
Hope she will give me healthy eggs!

ONE last question

When the moister is out from the vermeculite , then i should do what?
Spray between the eggs down in the vermeculite?

 

[Cainschams]

If i get that english right, you say that veileds are hard to get fertile eggs when mated the first time?
OR?

Sorry. I had went through the process of the retained clutches in my female panther. Veileds are a little different. You can breed them once then not have them lay any retained clutces if you follow the article kinyonga wrote for

http://raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.blogspot.com/

You can also not have them lay any infertile clutches if raised by the article. When the other poster said the more she lays the shorter her life will be I thought I would add this in. They are correct about the shorter lifespan.

When the moisture is out you can use a plastic syringe to drop water around the sides of the container. You dont want to get the eggs themselves wet. Also you want to go lightly so you dont add to much water. I would drop a little around the sides then check again a few days later when mine got a little dry. This way you can add just enough in moderation instead of oooops I added to much at once.

 

[Eyal]

You can also not have them lay any infertile clutches if raised by the article. When the other poster said the more she lays the shorter her life will be I thought I would add this in. They are correct about the shorter lifespan.

When the moisture is out you can use a plastic syringe to drop water around the sides of the container. You dont want to get the eggs themselves wet. Also you want to go lightly so you dont add to much water. I would drop a little around the sides then check again a few days later when mine got a little dry. This way you can add just enough in moderation instead of oooops I added to much at once.

Ok i will go gently, and adding more and more to when its perfect amount.

Thank you Cains!!
Very gentle of you

David


P.S. I will come back when she laid her eggs, thanks D.S.

 

[kinyonga]

cainschams said..."She can get them to lay only 1 clutch after being mated"...not true, I said..."Usually there is another clutch laid with some fertile eggs after this one ... so the diet/temperature process is repeated".

 

[Cainschams]

cainschams said..."She can get them to lay only 1 clutch after being mated"...not true, I said..."Usually there is another clutch laid with some fertile eggs after this one ... so the diet/temperature process is repeated".

Yes you did say that. Very sorry eyal and kinyonga. I thought I remembered that you would only have one clutch, being said from a different person on a thread I started when I first came to the forums. I get things a little jumbled up sometimes when tryng to stuff my brain with info and my a.d.d doesnt help me to much either. I should have read through again before I posted even though ive read that site tons of times. Again very sorry, my bad

 

[kinyonga]

Don't worry cainschams...it happens to all of us at times!