Sunken eyes

[summoner12]

OK so I saved a cham from Petsmart. He always had sunken eyes when I would see him at the store. The humidity level in the cage was always around 35-40%.

Now after having him for a couple of weeks in an enclosure that is always 50-65%, his eyes are still sunken. At times his eyes seem worse than other times. My mister goes off 7 times a day, every hour and a half from 6am until 3pm. I feed him crickets that I dust every other day. I have seen him eat a couple of green leafs once or twice from branches. I sometimes find him catching a cricket and an old dried up leaf at the same time. Is it bad for him to eat a brown leaf? (I keep a Ficus tree in the cage)

Any tips would be great, thanks in advance!

Here are a couple pictures of him from a few days ago.

and here is a pic from today... sorry it doesn't show his eyes very well.

Any overall health opservations and/or tips, feel free to share.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

He's adorable! To me he looks rather healthy, actually, and his eyes don't look bad. We have 2 male veileds. One of them has eyes that bulge out distinctly, and one has eyes that are a little deeper set. I have seen this in photos of veiled chams owned by members of this forum, too.

I'm no expert, though. So, stay tuned for some of the more seasoned folks to offer their advice. To me he looks like he's filling out nicely, and his color looks good, though a little pale. He has that cloudy/waxy look, like he's about to start a good shed!

 

[TRI0N]

Eyes don't look bad at all. I would make sure you get in his D3 supliments because I seriously doubt PetSmart was keeping that supliment at a good level. Avoid MBD from their lack of care.

Oh and the dried leaf is nothing to seriously worry about as long as it was not subject to mold. A brown leaf or green leaf is just fine and is part of their diet. Keeping your plants clean is important and dead leafs that are soiled or molded need to be remove before such can happen.

Other then that it looks very healthy.

 

[dodolah]

hmm.. i agree with Gesang.
some veiled does have a deeper eye set.
Mine is the same actually. I have to went to a wonderful vet that is recommended by many chameleon breeders here just to make sure.
he gave a clean bill of health and said to me that what just my baby cham's eyes look like.

one way to be sure is check his poop.
Is the urate part white (hydrated) ? or yellow (dehydrated)?
is the poop moist?

 

[dectr6]

OK so I saved a cham from Petsmart. He always had sunken eyes when I would see him at the store. The humidity level in the cage was always around 35-40%.

Now after having him for a couple of weeks in an enclosure that is always 50-65%, his eyes are still sunken. At times his eyes seem worse than other times. My mister goes off 7 times a day, every hour and a half from 6am until 3pm. I feed him crickets that I dust every other day. I have seen him eat a couple of green leafs once or twice from branches. I sometimes find him catching a cricket and an old dried up leaf at the same time. Is it bad for him to eat a brown leaf? (I keep a Ficus tree in the cage)

Any tips would be great, thanks in advance!

Here are a couple pictures of him from a few days ago.

and here is a pic from today... sorry it doesn't show his eyes very well.

Any overall health opservations and/or tips, feel free to share.

I also rescued a petsmart veiled about two months ago. I have to say, yours looks really good to me. His eyes don't look sunk in at all from the front view and the side views it's kinda hard to tell. He looks healthy and well cared for. It's unbelievable how they keep their chams. After I bought mine, I wrote the company a letter about the conditions they are keeping them in. Never heard a word back. Had him in a five gallon aquirium, one red basking light only. It was almost pitch black in his cage. They fed him three to five quarter inch crickets a day. The day I brought him home he ate twelve full grown crickets and has ever since. I quit going there because last time I went they had another one in the same setup and he looked very sick. I know people like us are part of the problem ie. if we didn't buy it, they wouldn't have ordered another to replace it. It's hard to see chams being mistreated and do nothing though. Mine's doing great and it looks as if yours is well on it's way. I've had no major problems other than some skin shedding issues which is improving greatly. He's shed five times in eight weeks. Good luck and keep us posted. Oh.. forgot... the dead leaf shouldn't be a problem. More knowledgable keepers may chime in about the ficus though. I thought I had read in a post that they were very slightly poisionous. Not enough to hurt. It may have been that the sap bothers them though. Others please correct me.

 

[summoner12]

Thanks for the input so far guys!

I thought I had also read something about ficus sap being bad for chams... Anyone else have some input on this?

I don't think I'll need to worry too much about the MBD. The cage he was kept in at Petsmart wasn't toooo bad.. He had TONS to eat from what I could tell. He had both a daylight and heat lamp in his cage. I purchased him mainly because of his reaction to me when I asked if I could hold him. Once the little 5 gallon cage was open and on the ground, I put my hand down next to him and he climbed right onto me. The clerk was shocked and said he was ALWAYS mean whenever they had to handle him. He was very grey and his eyes seemed worse than they are in these photos. Once I held him for a little bit he started turning green and didn't seem to mind me. So the next day I picked him up. He seems to have forgoten that tender moment we had that first day because he is a TOTAL jerk when I try to take him out of his cage. I have to kinda chase him around and trick him into running up my hand. Once he is out of the cage he calms down.

With respect to him having an attitude with my hands in his cage... any ideas? As keepers do we just deal with them being territorial or can we train them to realize they need to come out sometimes?

Also, am I dusting too much, every other day? Both of my chams seem to get the coke nose the day after I dust them.

 

[dectr6]

I'd say if he's got nasal discharge , you need to cut back on dusting. Everyone has a different schedule. I lightly dust about four crickets twice a week with calcium, two crickets once a week with herpavite and one small drop of vit.A once every two weeks. But, I heavily gutload almost all of his food,crix and grasshoppers, roaches, with dandelion greens and lots of other veggies. Dandelion is high in calcium and alot of other vitamins. Also put flukers orange cubes with CA. As far as his attitude...Mine had some built up dead skin from bad sheds which caused me to have to handle him every day for about a week. He is much,much better now about not attacking me. I don't know why this works, but it does for me...when you put your hands in to get him, put the open flats of your hands on each side of him so he can't turn around and he almost always will climb on my arm. This used to be an EXTREMELY nasty little beast. Good luck with yours. David

 

[dectr6]

Forgot to tell you. I saw flchams care sheets and they reccommend removing ficus from your cage now. They are saying it's a very bad irritant.

 

[dectr6]

That's Prism chams suggesting to get rid of the ficus, not flchams. David

 

[TRI0N]

Yes Ficus Sap which comes from the stems and not the leafs is bad. If you see white sap then remove the plant until its dried up. The leaf itself is not harmful either dry or fresh. The sap in the stems is harmfull. In no sap is present then there is nothing to fear. Eating the leafs is normal.

 

[TRI0N]

Lighting: Since he was in a cage with only a Heat Lamp then sure enough you should be concerened about MBD since heat lamps do not emit UVB (D3) and if the lamp emitted anything other then heat it was UVA. Since he was in Pet Smart care for however long I doubt he was exposed to UVB at all. Calcium with D3 is important. The "coke nose" you see is salt discharge and supliments can of course make this more frequent but its a normal process they have to discharge excessive salt in their system out their nose.

Depending on the age it would be wise to dust just a portion of his food. baby/juvi should be everyday where you just dust 1/4 or 1/3 of his food on schedule.

Monday/Thursday - Calcium no D3
Tusday/Friday - Calcium with D3
Wednesday/Saturday - Herptivite (Multi-Vit)
Sunday - Nothing


Adults can do use a grace schedule.

Monday - Calcium no D3
Tuesday - Nothing
Wednesday - Herptivite
Thursday - Nothing
Friday - Calcium with D3
Saturday - Nothing
Sunday - Nothing


You can always make Friday a day you give him something like 1-2 Wax Worm, Pheniox Worms, or Silk Worms rather then supliments for D3.

However his enclosure lighting will need UVB all the time from a ReptiSun 5.0 12 hours a day.

 

[summoner12]

Lighting: Since he was in a cage with only a Heat Lamp then sure enough you should be concerened about MBD since heat lamps do not emit UVB (D3) and if the lamp emitted anything other then heat it was UVA. Since he was in Pet Smart care for however long I doubt he was exposed to UVB at all.

You must be thinking about Dectr6's story about not having a UVB lamp in the cage at Petsmart.

My cham lives in a 30"x30"x48" cage with two 36" reptisun 10.0 lamps and two 100w zoomed daylight heat lamps in oposite corners.

The lighting is on from 5:30am till about 5:30pm He moves around his cage searching for food and cooling off.... exploring? I just hear him walking around in his tree a lot.

I just cleaned his cage yesterday so here is a picture of his poo from within the last 24 hours.

I took some more pics of him today to see if I could get a better shot of his eyes. Today they seemed worse than yesterday.. maybe I'm just a paranid keeper?

He didn't like my finger...

 

[dectr6]

His eyes do look sunken in. His poo looks fine. The only thing that would make me think about what you've said is the amount of UVB you have. I would not feel comfortable at all with that much. My cage is just a little smaller than yours and I only use a reptisun 5.0. 18 inch.That's all I've ever used for the past five years and never had any reason to question them. Hopefully there will be others on here that are better qualified in that area to help you. I don't know if too much UVB would cause this problem with the eyes. good luck and keep us posted

 

[summoner12]

I was concerned at first and watched him very closely to see if this was too much light for him. I have had a bad run in with the 10.0 compacts on a baby panther I had. This guy hasn't shown me any signs that indicate this is too much UV, unless his eyes being sunken is a corresponding issue.

I don't worry too much about it because these lights have been burned in for a while (they are now 4.5 months old). They shine into a large cage. I have been told larger cages cut out a lot of UV due to size and material used. He can get close to the lights but I never see him there for very long. He moves around a lot during the day.

 

[dectr6]

Drop Dave Weldon a PM about this. I just had a conversation with him a few days ago about mine. Like I said, my cage is almost the same size as yours and I was concerned I wasn't getting enough UVB due to only a 18" 5.0 reptisun. He has a meter that measures actual UVB output, as well as other wavelengths, at different distances through different materials. I was asking him should I go to an 18 or 24" 8.0. He said what I was using was more than adequate. He is very knowledgable on this subject and has been working with some of the manufacturers on some of the problems with their lights. I don't know if two much UVB can cause the problem your having but Dave will know and it won't hurt to ask. Good luck and let me know what you find out. David

 

[Dave Weldon]

Howdy,

One of these days you'll have to invite me to stop by with my Solarmeter 6.2 and take a few readings of your UVB setup . I drive through Lake Forest on my way to San Diego probably once or twice a month on a weekday. Two 10.0 tubes close-up is a lot of UVB . An Iguana would like it for sure . Your Reptarium screen will knock the UVB down probably close to half. If your chameleon can get within 0"-4" of it then it may be too much. Fortunately, you are not using compact 10.0 units which would potentially be a real eye problem. I would be tempted to either raise the pair of 10.0 tubes a few inches and/or replace one of the tubes with just a simple daylight fluorescent tube.

I wish I had a spectrometer to analyze wavelengths but I still have to rely on the measurements taken by my Vet friend in the UK who researches UVB for reptiles and reports her findings on the http://www.uvguide.co.uk and on http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/UVB_Meter_Owners.

Your rescued Veiled looks pretty good considering his past. The sunken eye problem may be just all of the stress that he's been under lately.

If you are looking for things to modify, can you arise his enclosure so that his basking spot is above anyone walking by? Is he in a room that isn't in a heavy traffic zone? Lots of minutes of misting is always a plus.

 

[summoner12]

Howdy,

One of these days you'll have to invite me to stop by with my Solarmeter 6.2 and take a few readings of your UVB setup . I drive through Lake Forest on my way to San Diego probably once or twice a month on a weekday. Two 10.0 tubes close-up is a lot of UVB . An Iguana would like it for sure . Your Reptarium screen will knock the UVB down probably close to half. If your chameleon can get within 0"-4" of it then it may be too much. Fortunately, you are not using compact 10.0 units which would potentially be a real eye problem. I would be tempted to either raise the pair of 10.0 tubes a few inches and/or replace one of the tubes with just a simple daylight fluorescent tube.

I wish I had a spectrometer to analyze wavelengths but I still have to rely on the measurements taken by my Vet friend in the UK who researches UVB for reptiles and reports her findings on the http://www.uvguide.co.uk and on http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/UVB_Meter_Owners.

Your rescued Veiled looks pretty good considering his past. The sunken eye problem may be just all of the stress that he's been under lately.

If you are looking for things to modify, can you arise his enclosure so that his basking spot is above anyone walking by? Is he in a room that isn't in a heavy traffic zone? Lots of minutes of misting is always a plus.

I just measured some of the places where he can climb close to the lights. There are two vines he can potentialy climb that take him within the 4" range. He can also walk on the "ceiling" to get within an inch of the lights, but that is rare and he never likes to be up-side-down. I have never seen him sit much closer than 4-5". The rest of his vines don't come closer than 5.5-6". The 5.5-6" range is about as close as he comes on a regular basis. Like I said before he moves around a lot and is almost never in the same spot for very long. He likes to sit under his heat lamps for extended periods of time in the morning and after taking a shower. Those basking spots are about 6-7" on one side of the cage and 8-10" on the other side. I can easily raise the lamps higher and extend my reflector.

As for his height to others in the room and the amount of traffic. He can climb to about 65" above the ground within his cage. I added some leafs to the front of his cage so he can feel more secure. He doesn't seem to mind me walking by or coming close to the cage. He watches me as I go by but doesn't really flinch until the cage is open and he sees a hand within the cage. My little guy Jake is the same, he will just look right back at you until you open his cage... then he runs off to hide, unless you bring food.

If you would like to come by sometime with your meter I would appreciate it! Let me know when you are headed to SD next time. I have never had an experienced cham keeper give me tips in person. A reading of the lights would be interesting. I have read all about how the screen blocks out about half the UVB and since the lights are older I figure it isn't too much UV. I would hate to switch to 5.0 if I don't have to, I have another 2 10.0s I haven't used yet. I have them for when I change Jake's cage over to a larger size. as I said before, it is simple for me to raise the light ficture if needed.