unhappy cham

[brandaleon]

hey guys. I have a 5 month old male ambilobe and recently i have been seeing mostly dark colors from him(as if upset). I sometimes get very beautiful green, red, blue, yellow and orange. I am wondering what could be wrong with my setup.

He is in a cage 40" high 18" wide and 24"long.
the temps at high are 90 and low temps are mid 70s
he gets 14 hrs/day of uva & b
the tank is well ventilated
watered daily via dripper 1hr- and sprayed
feed choice of silkworms, crickets, mealworms and superworms
i have the tank raised off the floor about 3' so the highest perching site for him is about 6'
He has no interactions with other animals except me

Do you guys have any suggestions?

 

[ken2414]

when did you get him??
and are you mistaking his darker basking colors for the mood?
It could be also that your uv light is going bad, mine did that once and when i fixed it he was green again

 

[Brad Ramsey]

It's an epidemic!
Veileds and Panthers alike .....
I truly believe it is due to it being Winter.

-Brad

 

[ken2414]

yeah it could be that and probably is the winter

 

[Brad Ramsey]

I'd reduce the "lights on" time to 8 to 10 hours per day.
Is he going to bed way before you turn the lights off?

-Brad

 

[ken2414]

mine does that he fell asleep an hour earlier than usual the lasr couple of weeks

 

[brandaleon]

i got him about 2.5 months ago. He seems to stay his basking colors even when away from the basking site. and most time he stays up beyond light out.

 

[brandaleon]

another thing. he crawls on the screen side alot lately, when i open the door he crawls on me and then brightens up.

 

[Justin Carl]

well, when my chameleons get restless like that i free range them.
try setting something up that he can explore a little.
i advise you only to do this under supervision.
I freerange all my chams. i try to do one a week. They seem to really enjoy it.
So, if he gets his happy colors out of his cage he is getting excited.
so go ahead and try it. i think dodolah gave it a shot and it worked aswell.

 

[canbman]

dark colors

I have a muontain dwarf (rudis)and she also remains mostly in her basking dark color.when she is hunting down food or sleeping she turns a very vivid light green.I have tried different lights different locations etc.and it doesn't seem to matter so I am hoping to that maybe it's just the season

 

[brandaleon]

yeah i hope it is the season because i know that you all don't recommend free ranging panthers because they are so active.