I was told to cut the heads off of the mealworms im going to feed my veiled chameleon? The person said that if I didnt the heads of the mealworms could chew through the chams stomach if they werent all the way dead or the nerves of the head could still be moving? Please help

Don't listen to the pet stores or whoever told you that. That is not true of mealworms, or superworms.

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Friends are the family that you get to choose
1.0 Sambava- Lenny 1.0 Ambanja- Boomer ~ RIP My Big Beautiful Boy Romeo

Thanks a lot Carol! Yeah they said if the mealworm wasn't completely dead that the head could start chewing through his stomach?

no that is a myth! Have not ever heard of one single instance of that ever happening, and not even with the big superworms.

This is an authentic chameleon urban myth. It started in the 90s and the closest thing we could figure out is that someone saw a mealworm crawling through a dead body.
When chameleons chew they kill the food. No Pinnochio story here.

And, no, you do not have to worry about uncontrolled nerves guiding the mouth to bore through anything around it. No zombie story either!

This comes up so often! Maybe we should get the Mythbusters to debunk this myth once and for all!

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1.0 Sambava, 1.0 Jackson's, 1.0 Jungle/diamond carpet python (75% jungle /25% diamond)

With all the hundreds of cham owners on here, I am sure someone would have posted if it was true.

My father-in-law claims this happened to his iguana back in the 90's, the vet told him one of the mealworms supposedly ate through his stomach lining, releasing all the acids into his body, creating a nasty infection and unfortunately killing the iguana.

This is all I have ever heard, besides what I read on here.

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1.0 Veiled - Ziggy - 11 Months Old [Sire = Newton Blue Veiled]

I don't think much of your father in law's practice of feeding mealworms to an iguana, and I think even less of his vet for telling him such baloney.

Mealworms + wet = drown instantly

zillions of mealworms + thousands of lizards + over 30 years feeding, sometimes as a staple for some species = zero chewouts happening in my lizards.

Since when do iguanas even eat insects..? That story sounds weird.

Considering that Chameleons are so well adapted for their lifestyles, having as good as five arms, four with those amazing hands, 360 degree vision, not to mention the tongue and the colour changing - it really would be a pretty weird thing if eating insects was too much for them . As long as your mealworms are going down easy then they can be used as a good treat on occasion.