Leftover crickets

So I usually put in up to 5 small crickets 1/8" or 1/4" for my pygmy chameleon each day. But there are always stray crickets left over. My question is should I wait for my Cham to eat these crickets before putting in new ones? Should I start feeding every other day? Is there a way to take them out? It's hard to catch them because of the branches in the cage. Should I start feeding less each day?
I don't want them dying in there because then I may never find them unless I take the enclosure apart.
Also caught one crawling around on the chameleon. Is that ok?

So long as he is eating

I would let them free roam, and monitor not his intake but his poo..

Better to have to much than not enough.

Also consider a feeder cup that he can get into and out of but the crickets can not.

actually, no.

loose bugs leads to bug bites.


cricket loves to munch on chamies, and the pygmies are cute and tasty.

Depends on bugs..

yes sorry, I let the locusts, and the crickets free roam if they get outta the feeder cup... it happens..

Also mine is veiled, not pygmy, not that this makes any difference there is a potential for the predator to be pre-dated,...


Does not make it best practice.

Scoobthenoob said:

yes sorry, I let the locusts, and the crickets free roam if they get outta the feeder cup... it happens..

Does not make it best practice.

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for the bigger species, its not great, but its not as big a deal.

pygmies are already low on the ground to begin with....

even when I cup feed my crickets get loose sometimes but since i have veileds and panthers, they don't get munched on

Yep I jumped in to offer advice, it was wrong

Well, I would still not reduce the food amount, Just re-capture the ones that made a bid for freedom just before lights out, and put them in again the day after.

Monitor his poo

Scoobthenoob said:

Well, I would still not reduce the food amount, Just re-capture the ones that made a bid for freedom just before lights out, and put them in again the day after.

Click to expand...

and that's the way to do it. lol.

if you see them, remove them.

The person I got him from just put the crickets in.
Anyway I'll try my best. Anyone have cricket catching techniques? I use a pair of tweezers...it's pretty hard to catch them.

fingers

fingers... and cupped hand

Free-roamed my crickets for years. NEVER had an issue, so long as somewhere in the enclosure you leave some veggies/ grain for the crickets to eat, that's easily accessible to them, (i place mine on the enclosure floor) and they won't touch your Chameleon.

This depends on the cricket species.
Brown banded cricks are very docile and do not bite.
The black field cricks are a different story! those suckers bite, and they are aggressive.
There is a dark brown species (don't know the name) that is also very aggressive.
I buy and raise only the brown banded ones, they also don't smell as bad as the black field's.

There are nearly always loose cricks in my cham cages, but they all gather on top, under the warm lamp, or in the top corner.
But, all my guys are pretty big, nothing like a pyg!!

They don't move much either, it's like they can sense that there is a predator about.