The "Hibernation" Experiment

[Brad Ramsey]

I have been talking about this a little bit throughout the summer and have officially started.
We have had freezing temps (officially) here the last two nights and of course the days are getting noticeably shorter.
We "fall back" a week from Sunday and the chameleons have started roosting much earlier ..... so here we go.
Official documentation has been posted on the Kitty Blog and will be updated weekly November through February.
Any thoughts, ideas or suggestions would be welcome.
For anyone who may have fears for the well being of my chameleons, rest assured that this is going to be a very controlled, gradual and safe experiment.
At the first sign that it may not be a good idea, I will stop or adjust the conditions.
I am not planning for the temperature to fall below 58 degrees f. at any time during the experiment.

-Brad

 

[casidonacid]

Hey Brad good luck and hope everything goes as planned.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Glad to see you're doing it, Brad, and we look forward to viewing the results.

 

[reyesjoshuacruz]

are there no studies on brum avail?

 

[Brad Ramsey]

are there no studies on brum avail?

Have you seen any?
Surely there are, but this will be a new (albeit informal and anecdotal) one.

-Brad

 

[reyesjoshuacruz]

no i havent seen any

i was going to try something like this when i had a large group, but i couldnt find enough info to make me feel comfortable about it. i was just wondering if you knew of any studies i could read over.

 

[Brad Ramsey]

I don't.
All I have heard of is that in their native habitat they disappear during the cold season.
My personal experience is that things do slow down for them during the winter.

-Brad

 

[reyesjoshuacruz]

Have you noticed the increase in fat at the base of the tail before they start to slow?

My males would always show what i thought was increased fat storage(most obvious at the base ).

 

[ToniandGizmo]

Great experiment. It makes good sense. All living creatures are affected by the seasons. Slowing them down for the Madagasgar "Winter" will assure that they are truly being treated as they would be in the wild.

I'll be following this closely.

 

[Brad Ramsey]

Great experiment. It makes good sense. All living creatures are affected by the seasons. Slowing them down for the Madagasgar "Winter" will assure that they are truly being treated as they would be in the wild.

I'll be following this closely.

You mean the Yemen winter

-Brad

 

[kinyonga]

All of my chameleons have temperature fluctuations during the year....so there is a kind of brumation endured by them all.

I have brumated uromastyx, chamaeleo chameleons and some other lizards but I have never done a real hibernation with any of them. If the parameters required are misjudged it may kill them.

 

[Sepioteuthis]

I have brumated uromastyx, chamaeleo chameleons and some other lizards but I have never done a real hibernation with any of them.

I thought brumation and hibernation are the same thing, just that the first is in cold-blooded animals and the second in warm-blooded. Or am I wrong?

 

[Brad Ramsey]

I thought brumation and hibernation are the same thing, just that the first is in cold-blooded animals and the second in warm-blooded. Or am I wrong?

I have to say, "I don't know"
I have always assumed they were synonomous.

At any rate ... we are going for a rather "soft brumation"
I don't think any lives are in danger, food will be offered on a slightly slowed down schedule and water will always be available.

-Brad

 

[kinyonga]

Brad...I hope I didn't give you the idea that you were going to have problems.

Hibernation is different than brumation....brumation is more of a slowing down of the processes whereas hibernationn involves more.

This might help explain it...scan down below the part about dormancy...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dormancy

 

[Sepioteuthis]

I think in a way we're all right.

This is what it said in the wiki link Kin posted:

Brumation is an example of dormancy in reptiles that is similar to hibernation.[1][2] It differs from hibernation in the metabolic processes involved.[3]

I went to reference [3], which is a bearded dragon care page where it says the following:

Herpetologists use or used the word brumation for the reptile version of hibernation. it's essentially the same thing, but it's a different metabolic process. Mammals used stored fat for energy, reptiles use glycogen.

So the reason it's a different metabolic process is simply because reptile metabolism differs from mammalian metabolism. It's the same phenomenon, just in a different group of animals.

 

[kinyonga]

When I brumate a uromastyx it periodically comes out to look around, maybe get a drink of water and bask a bit and then goes back into the hide for another long period of time. I haven't found that they eat even though I leave dry lentils (which they love) in the cage.

When a turtle goes down for the winter, it doesn't come out/resurface....so to me its a deeper "sleep" than the uro has.

Its similar for mammals....squirrels will periodically appear in my yard over the winter to eat the birdseed but I don't see the raccoons until spring.

So...IMHO I don't think its so much a difference between mammals and reptiles as its a difference in what the animal can tolerate or needs to do to survive.

From what I've heard with the C. chamaeleons...they are gone completely for several months and then come out in the warmer weather and stay out...when the insects would be back.

It seems like it has to do with food supply. A squirrel can find crab apples, hibernating insects under the bark of trees and seeds and other foods outside in the winter so IMHO they come out periodically on the nice days.

Raccoons won't likely find enough to eat to make the outings metabolically worth it so they just stay put.

This is just the way I've looked at it....I refer to it as brumation if the animal shows activity during that time and hibernation if it stays put.

 

[Sepioteuthis]

Ok, I've done some more reading and it appears that Kin is right about it not being the same thing.
Hibernation is a state where the animal stays in deep torpor for the entire period without getting up during warmer days. The number of mammals that actually do this is very small. Tree squirrels, as Kin pointed out don't actually hibernate, but many ground squirrels do. Raccoons also don't truly hibernate and will emerge from time to time (link, link, link )
Also I read in my old college textbook "Vertebrate life" that there are no carnivores that truly hibernate, they just sleep a lot when it's too cold to go out.

Back to reptiles, everything that I've been able to find on brumation does state that the animals wake up from time to time, on warm days. So in that way it differs from true hibernation.

What I haven't been any to find yet is if coldblooded animals are actually capable of the physiological state required for true hibernation. Or if, based on the climate and the species, there is just a difference in activity level during brumation.
For instance I found this link that states that "sliders may emerge from brumation during periods of warmer weather".

And here I thought I could get through the day without learning anything.

 

[kinyonga]

The more I read the more confused I'm getting!

"Brumation. A state similar to hibernation in which a reptile dramatically reduces its food intake although it may still drink. Both hibernation and brumation are a response to cold weather but in brumation the animal responds does not exhibit the extreme torpor of a hibernating animal."
http://www.adcham.com/html/husbandry/glossary.html

Some sites that talk about hibernation....
http://www.anapsid.org/hibernation.html
http://www.petplace.com/reptiles/hibernation-in-turtles/page1.aspx
http://www.sciencemadesimple.com/animals.html#ANIMALS
http://www.northern.edu/natsource/REPTILES/Wester1.htm
http://www.gartersnake.info/articles/003222_garter_snakes_in_win.phtml

Interesting about the not breathing....
http://watchingtheworldwakeup.blogspot.com/2008/07/i-go-for-bike-ride-with-turtle.html
"There’s no other creature on the planet that can pull off that trick. Several other turtles- including the famed Snapping Turtle, Chelydra serpentina-, also hibernate underwater sans breathing, but the Painted Turtle is the endurance champion."

 

[Brad Ramsey]

I will be writing an entry on the blog in the next day or two, but I will post here with some of my early findings:

The first couple of weeks I kept the ambient temperatures in the room at 58 to 62 degrees at night and around 64 to 66 degrees in the daytime.
(this has not changed)
The chameleons each had a low wattage basking bulb that would turn on with the UVB light each morning at 6:45 and off each afternoon at 4:30.
(basking temp in the low eighties)

Activity was low. Both animals drank well, but the female stopped eating altogether. She seems fat and so I provided her with the big laying bin as I suspected she may need to lay again.
The male was eating a little bit (one or two superworms every three or four days)

Today I raised the basking temps in both enclosures. I feel like the light schedule and night time temps are fine, but I am thinking they need to be able to warm up more during the day.
The female has had a very positive response to a warmer basking spot.

Some preliminary research indicates that even in winter the daytime temps in Yemen can get pretty warm.

Still not sure if the female needs to lay or not. She is still not eating, but she remains healthy and is more active now, showing great color.

In summary, here is where I am at:

Lights on for 9 hrs and 45 min. per day
Night time temps: high 50's to low 60's
Daytime ambient temp: low to mid 60's
Basking temps: 85 to 88 degrees.

I will be reducing the time that lights are on over the next couple of weeks. My goal is 8 to 8.5 hours. After December 21st I will slowly increase the time lights are on.

-Brad

 

[ToniandGizmo]

You mean the Yemen winter

-Brad

Yesssss the Yemen winter.... Sorry about that Brad.