Hello cham-forums community!

I am brand new to the hobby, and will be getting my first male panther in about 3 weeks. I have been doing a TON of research, but know it's always helpful to hear first hand experiences from handlers. My question is in regards to keeping a male and female in the same enclosure. I know that this topic is probably covered in other threads/web sites. But, I haven't been able to tell if it is only appropriate when trying to breed... or if many handlers have a male and female coupled full time?? thanks in advance for responses

p.s. I dont even have my cham yet, and I'm totally addicted to the hobby. gotta be one of the most exciting animals to keep. just stating the obvious, lol.

wait for more experienced to answer, haha, but I think the bottom line is only to breed.

Keep them seperated at all times visually and physically until the female is ready to breed. Then introduce male to her enclosure.

oh ok. I was hoping to add a female eventually, but now i know better.

The reason you don't want them to see each other is because the male will keep showing off towards the female and if the female isn't receptive she will stress out trying to get away from him.

The reason you don't want them in the same cage together is because generally the female will be stressed out the entire time. If they are growing up, generally one will become dominant and get all the food, bully the other out of basking spots, and the non-dominant will generally slowly start to get in really bad shape.

Some chameleon species can be kept together in male-female groups, but not panthers.

If you are considering breeding chameleons, I would suggest keeping one for a while then doing a lot of research. It is very expensive and time consuming.


- On a side not, if you had a large room / free range / cage ranging from 10ft x 10ft x 10 ft you could probably keep them together if you had 2 basking spots and 2 feeding spots.

@rocky- Thanks for your help. I understand it now. Oh, and in regards to me breeding.... don't worry, I have no plans on breeding anytime soon(if ever). I will leave that to much more experienced keepers for now. although I must admit, when considering the "retail value" of panthers in particular.... It SEEMS pretty dang lucrative. But, I'm sure there is a lot of work before profits.

Let me tell you about yesterdays experience. I got a new male in hes 1.5 months old. My female is 2 months old. When I got the male in I was still dialing in his enclosure so I figured I'd put him in with the female for half an hour while I finished up. The female immediatley fired up hissed gaped and all that. The poor new baby didnt know what to do, I of course immediately seperated them. I thought that since they were so young that they wouldn't care to be together for 30 minutes but that was not the case! On a side note it was kind of cool to see my female get mad I didn't think she had it in her!

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1.1 Ambilobe

haha wow, all happened instantly huh? How are you planning on keeping them from seeing each other? a towel draped between the cages? separate rooms?

Hmm that's weird lol, supposedly they can be housed together as young babies. I know where I got my veiled there were several others with her and they all seemed to be getting along with each other.

Yah the kicker of the situation was that the female rarely ever hangs out around in the cage she basks in the morning, eats, drinks then kinda hangs out in the plant. As soon as she saw the baby she went right to the center of the cage to assert her dominance shes always been so calm, she saw the little man and flipped must be a man hater.It did happen dang near instantly, she saw him and inflated I thought she would float away! I just have them across the room now and its all good.