Yemen Help

[dasher256]

hello everyone i was looking for some help on my cham for set up and feeding and stuff like that. i have tried RFUK but they keep giving me bad information soem of the people and some of them keep having goes at me for how i am keeping the chameleon thats its all incorrect and everything?
she is very young and has been sold to me a bit too young, i got told she is 6-8 weeks old so im not completely sure, i have difficulties cup feeding her and she tends to keep going black everytime near the basking light which i have been told its not enough heat for her then? and i dont know if the set up is set up ok for a yougn baby for now? could i get some help please

 

[KingJulian]

Welcome to the forum!! Your Cham is very cute setup looks pretty good, personally I don't like anything in the bottom of my chams cage. Sometimes they will shoot at a cricket and they can choke on the mulch. Also I would add a plant to the middle so your Cham has hiding spots.

 

[Tannervan20]

I would take out the substrate and go to Walmart and buy a umbrella plant for like 12 dollars. The basking area for a baby needs to be about 85-90. Also I would go to the hardware store and buy lamp fixtures for your bulbs.... (You don't want them on the inside of your cage because they could crawl on them and burn themselves) sometimes my baby panther likes when I use tongs and feed him/her it helped a lot. Also make sure your dusting with calcium WITHOUT d3 every day and with d3 twice a month. Hope this helps

 

[Tannervan20]

Also you don't need a water bowl because you probably already know that they don't drink from water bowls. Make sure your misting the Cham down twice to 3 times a day!!

 

[andy123]

We're not having a go at you on rfuk one bit, we have said we suggest you remove the substrate, try and get the lighting out of the cage to enable a bigger cage and no risk of burns meaning you can put more in the cage including live plants and to try a strip uv bulb due to them being more beneficial then a coiled one. And the mensioned misting due to the dripper only giving off water and not humidity in which chameleons need humidity and we also advised being aware that the cage wont be big enough for her soon

how this is classed as having a go id like to know...?

 

[qdude46]

Remove the substrate and water dish immediately because they are useless and can cause health hazards. you are right about how young she seems and im almost positive that very young chams dont need much of a basking light. Also i see that you have the bulbs in the cage, you are going to need to get a light dome and put it on top of the enclosure because she can easily get burned and lastly one or two more plants can be put in there because the foliage will make her feel at home. and about the cup feeding, it may take awhile for her to get adjusted to it and if im incorrect about anything, some please correct me.

 

[dasher256]

some people tend to inbox having a go of doing everythin inccorect. and teh water bowl is there for when the dripper is being used that water will go somewhere and then i can remove that water instead of it spilling everywhere and makign everything very wet but will swap the subrate soon and i only use the strip due to information i got of a friend of one point that he used it for a while and nothing bad happened and it worked alright for him, i understand if the lights are inside the tank if she stretches for them then it can burn her thats why im going to get a reflector soon but she has been with me for about a month all together with the bulbs inside her tank and she has never climbed towards the light she has layed under it to heat up then walked away to the other side of the tank and just left it and she i know about the usage of the suppliments so its not a isssue for me with them. thank you

 

[carol5208]

Just be careful even with the reflectors as we had a member whose chameleon managed to get between the reflector and the light and got stuck. It burned the poor little chameleons leg off! She is a little cutie and I would hate to see something happen to her. The will climb on the ceiling of the cages also if they are screen.

 

[andy123]

its not necessarily what you see her do, its what she does when your not at home, when she gets abit bigger she might be able to touch the bulbs etc... its when your not there to watch them things can go wrong... like if one of the bulbs fell because the cable came loose and was sat on the floor of the cage that could then heat up and get dangerous... if its outside the tank and fitted in a holder then theres no risk of this

Its mainly preventions and not having a go

 

[Lovereps]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm very glad you've found it and hope you'll stay.

Many people here have a great deal of experience with chams and have had their own mishaps or made their own husbandry mistakes, which they have since learned from. Most of us have also read of tragedies and learned from them.

When you read the health forum for a while , you'll get to see what the most common accidents and illnesses are.

I'm sure that I also speak for many others on the forum when I say that it truly makes me sad to read many of the unfortunate things that have occurred, especially when many of them were preventable.

Some people are better at expressing things that upset them than others are.
Most people here (if not all) would be very pleased for you to have many years enjoying your healthy chameleon.
Please try to keep this in mind when people respond in ways that irritate or offend you.

Chams ingesting substrate or rocks is a very common and too often fatal accident.

The absolute best reason for getting the bulb out of the enclosure is perfectly illustrated in this thread here:
https://www.chameleonforums.com/need-help-immediately-99410/


Accidents will always happen but we try to warn people of the dangers that there are.

 

[Chameleonsinc]

Adding my 2 cents with everyone else... No substrate! Too easily injested. Remove the bowls. Schefelarra ( umbrella plants ) are great plants for little chams, my home depot sells em for less than $6. Buy a cheap plant mister, and wash it thoroughly. Use bottled water and mist 3 times daily. She's so small and it's summer, you might not even need the basking lamp depending on your local weather. But you will need a uvb, grab an 18" flourescent. Give her as much to eat as she'll munch, but be carefull not to over feed. Check the care sheets here but she needs to be on a calcium regiment. Shell be fine as long as you fix the cage issues.

 

[dasher256]

this was a little upgrade of th tank after the UV has now been removed and swapped for a tube and added in 2 dragon tree's in the back of course and only left 1 plastic plant because it reaches higher so better for her to bask