Even for those of us who own only one chameleon and have no initial intention of aquiring more or starting a "breeding project", the idea cannot help but sneak into your head.
It is the ultimate achievement in the hobby, a mark of success that has the characteristic of personal triumph and it's very exciting to consider.
I think about it every day and at 20 years old I would have already leapt, but being 40 I have learned to consider these ventures more thoroughly before proceeding. Make no mistake, the level of my enthusiasm remains constant and is actually at some points difficult to control.
You are all familiar with my recent experience concerning a gravid female Jackson's chameleon. What will happen there remains still to be determined, but it has inspired me to document my thoughts and present them for your consideration.
So here are my thoughts concerning breeding:
I have friends who breed Persian Cats, I have friends who breed Wheaten Terriers and I myself once had a rather large breeding project of cockatiels and English Budgies. I have some knowledge and experience with what a project like this requires and my number one piece of advice is: dispel all delusions of fortune! If done properly, you will probably not make any money. This is an expensive hobby at best when practiced on the level that most of us are able to achieve, and you can hope to possibly recoup some of your costs but chances are that money will go right back to the chams.
Do you have the space required? It is the responsibility of a hobbyist who breeds to get their babies to a decent size and level of health and hardiness before considering sending them to new homes and some of these clutches can be quite large.
Do you have time? Consider the time you spend now and multiply it by ????
Who will take these babies? What if you can't find homes for all of them? Are you prepared to properly ship them? And most of all, how will you screen perspective buyers?
After you have invested money, time, space.....your heart, soul, blood, sweat and tears....who can possibly be worthy to assume care for your babies?
At the very least you will have to compose a care sheet and some documentation on each one.
You need to be prepared to answer questions later too, and provide new owners with your contact information.
Most of us already know all of this but I have found it therapeutic to compile these thoughts and questions and would love other keepers and breeders to share their thoughts and experiences as I continue to struggle with my over-zealous tendencies to dive in!

-Brad

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http://raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.blogspot.com/
Dedicated to promoting superior care for Veiled Chameleons

Nicely said, Brad.

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Julirs http://www.julirschameleons.com 2.2.50+ Veiled 1.1 Oustalet 1.2 Nosy Be 5.3.3 Pygmelions 1.0 Fischers 0.0.1 Mellers 0.1 Ambilobe 0.1 Side-Striped

Howdy,

A few of my thoughts on hatchlings:

Food--
About 2 years ago, I was helping a friend with her Veiled eggs when she had to go out of town. Sure enough, I found myself hatching 55 little critters. For the next 10 days I got to see how much these little ones eat. If you aren't raising your own pinheads and fruit flies, you'll go broke. In 3 months you'll spend $100's on food.

Do you have enough enclosures to keep the head-count per enclosure at a low stress loading? My current batch of 9 panther hatchlings hatched from day 270 to day 376. That variation in size means more separate enclosures.

Be sure to have a confirmed plan as to what you are going to do with all of them.

Will you still have the same level of interest in raising chameleons a year after starting your breeding program? This isn't a hobby that you can just put on the shelf and start-up again later. Once those eggs are laid, you have your work cut out for you. The larger portion of work won't start for 6-12 months and won't end for months after that.

Planning on going out of town? It's hard enough making sure that your adult critters are taken care of while you're out of town but babies add another dimension to the level of responsibility... more feeder issues, more misting issues, more lighting issues... the list goes on.

I've not bred any myself. I've been "lucky" enough to hatch veileds and panthers for others, including having their female panther lay her eggs at my house.

Be careful what you wish for .

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See Ya,

Dave Weldon
Panther & Veileds

Book Collection:
"Reptile Medicine and Surgery" 2nd ed. By Mader
"Chameleons - Their Care and Breeding" By Linda J. Davison
"Chameleons - Nature's Hidden Jewels" 2nd Ed. By Petr Necas
"The Panther Chameleon: Color Variation, Natural History, Conservation and Captive Management" By Gary W. Ferguson...
"Thoughts for Food" 3rd Ed. Edited by Ardi Abate
"Understanding Reptile Parasites" By Roger J. Klingenberg D.V.M.

For your average home breeder, it's not a profit making venture, especially when you are breeding species that are sold inexpensively like veileds or jacksons. The money and time spent raising the hatchlings to a sellable size are definitely not worth the income in the end. There is the satisfaction of seeing your female sucessfully lay, then watching the eggs hatch, and finally seeing the babies grow into stable juveniles. For some, educating prospective buyers of the offspring is rewarding as well. And finally, there is the satisfaction of providing captive bred babies to the market, which leads to less animals imported from thier native ranges.

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1.1 ambilobe panther chameleons(Sniper and Cinnamon)
1.0 dendrobates azureus(blue dart frog)
1.0 siberian husky(Siku, means ice in alaskan)
1.0 alaskan malamute(Kobuk, name of region in Alaska)
0.1 mexican yellowheaded amazon parrot(Lucia)

oh ya they eat alot! i hatched some veild eggs almost 3 months ago on novemeber 15 2006 and the first month they ate 5000 pinheads , i couldnt beleive it they just ate like machines lol , but next time im gona have my own colony of silkworms and fruit flies cause i have spent over $1000 in the last 3 months feeding them , iv broke even with buying crickets and selling the babies , but they come first i always feed them like they eat better then i do lol ahah

Hey everybody .... great words of inspiration and warning. I myself have been thinking that I would love to be able to go to my little warehouse of creatures everyday and look after and try to breed them. Not to make a fortune but just enough to survive.

Quite often the thoughts of expenses, raising my own feeders, ensuring the proper conditions and medical issues can become overwhelming. Compound that with the insane Hydro bills along with trying to find responsible buyers for the animals that you breed and it all seems impossible. However I currently keep freshwater aquariums and have been breeding a few fish and growing aquarium plants and selling them.

I've decided that I would need to win a fairly large sum of money in the lottery to get started and then have many different types of animals/plants for sale to even come close to what I would be spending. There would also be a need for many low maintenance items ... such as aquarium plants .... to offset the time taken on the high maintenance ones ... like chams!

So I keep buying lottery tickets hoping for my little aqua-reptile room dream to come true. Until that time I'll keep as many amazing creatures as I can afford to and learn as much as I can about the ones that I can't ... waiting for the day that I can.

P.S. I've got 26 veiled eggs due in March sometime so I'm sure that the impact of reality might put a small dent in this little dream!! Or maybe it will just fuel it more??

Dyesub Dave.

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3.3.30 Eggs Veiled Chams, 1.0.0 Banded Gecko, 1.2.0 Crested Geckos, 0.0.2 Micro Geckos,
1.1.0 Honduran Milk Snakes,0.1.0 Snow Corn Snake, 7 - Fish Tanks and 1 AWESOME boy!!

I've got a few stories to illustrate my position.

I've been attending a few of the reptile breeder shows for a few years now
and have chatted with a few people over that time.
Many have brought up the topic of breeding these animals for profit
and I've met others that have experienced the unforeseen difficulties inherent
starting a breeding colony and either bailed out or given up on the idea.

Basically, when I first had the idea to have by small collection of pets start
paying their fair share of the rent. (replacing my ex-girlfriend's share).
I realized that it was going to present challenges and be accordingly difficult
in relation to the price of the animals.

There's always more to learn than what people first assume.

Without any foolproof information or any really helpful people
to guide me along the way I was left for a great deal
to learn, think about and footwork to do.

On one hand I'm happy that there's a forum to help people with their pets care.
However, I also see some dangers that may have repercussions for everyone
and disappointment for many that only see the front end of a business market.

Personally, the possibility of widespread breeding by random hobby keepers "-ain't cool"
It'll will only complicate breeding domestic stocks.
Even perhaps, resulting in the destruction of the emerging market by flooding it with
randomly mixed animals to a still largely uninformed public that STILL needs to be developed.

The creation of any new market is a "delicate time" when viewed beyond the scope of an individual.
There's much that needs to happen and "tended" before things can really get established.
Random people have the ability to destroy all the potential by jumping in and mucking things up.
but that's really something that should have it's own thread. (sorry)

I hope that this contributes to the thread.~

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"In Target earlier today I learned there is really no good way to answer a 5-year-old asking you why you are looking at his mother's butt so much..."

Me and my girlfriend are planning on selling chameleons in the near future. We love chameleons and we are constantly learning and asking questions to the people who are already very successful in this industry. Me and my gf have invested so much money and time to chameleons that no matter what happens we are going to have no regrets. We hope to share our knowledge and love of chameleons to everyone that is willing to listen and learn. Its not about money to us, We both grew up loving reptiles at a very young age. I would save up money at the age of 7 to buy turtles, lizards, snakes, frogs, as well as catching them in my backyard. Chameleons I would have to say is my most favorite pet that I have ever owned. WE LOVE THEM !!!!!!

I will add some of my experience in this thread too.

I started with my first Male Veiled Chameleon around December 2004. Now I ended up with 9 adults and 6 subadults (Panther and Veiled). It is a very addicting hobby. At first I was thinking of making money out of them. However, it is almost impossible to make any profit. I realize it when I hatched out my first clutch of veiled chameleon; 30 total. I was still naive, so I buy fruit flies and pinheads online. within a month, I spend about $300 just for food. They are eating like pigs. Towards the end, i start calculating, the electric bill, water and food i spends on the adults and hatching the babies; by selling all 30 of them wouldn't even cover back the amount I spend. Then, the female died from eggs bound.

I acquired a pair of Jackson not too long later and success breeding them; however, the babies never survive pass 2 month old (i lost 2 clutch; 22 babies in total). I was so dissappointed and sad. I change my mind soon....it is just a hobby and not a career. You can't count how many chick you will have by looking at the amount of eggs you have. Some will not hatch, some will die after hatching from disease etc.....

Yet, I already sunk waist deep.... I bought a pair of Panther without thinking (at that time Ambilobe panther is still rare; I pair a pair of 2 months old for $900 - the female died after laying 2nd clutch). Now, to me breeding chameleon is a challange in life not just for profit but for fun and experience. I have a job that would be able to pay for my espensive hobby. Breeding and selling chameleon is never a good idea unless you are able to acquire a lot of breeding pair and have time and effort for caring all of them. Also, you must have tons of space to house them too.

Everyone is thinking...Oh... FLChams, ChamCo, Kammer are earning huge amount of money breeding chameleon, to a certain degree....they are. However, one have to consider that they have a lot of breeding pair to begin with, also they have time and spance for them. They are very experience in Chameleons.

(p/s: Also........after hatching so many babies.....i was reluctant to sell them...they are so so so so so cute!!!!)

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2.2 Ambilobe 35 Baby Ambilobe 4.3 Veiled 19 Baby Veiled~ I am Poh, I am a Chameleon-holic

I just wanted to put my 2 cents in on breeding. While I totally agree with breeding being rather difficult and in no way think it will make me any money at all, I am doing it for 2 reasons. Number one, I have an 8 year old son, who loves animals and totally addicted to chameleons, and this hobby. He is the number one reason I am going to try to breed. I would love to have him see the cycle of life for this wonderful creature. Number two, is because I also am addicted to the chameleons and would also love to see the cycle. I am in no way trying to get rich or make a living off of breeding. I would not say that I am a novice at chameleons, but I think just like many of you would consider yourselves, fairly knowledgeable with these amazing creatures. I do have alot to learn about them and probably will always have alot to learn about them, but isn't that what makes this hobby so exciting and interesting. Even the most intelligent on these creatures will still tell you that they don't know enough about these creatures and probably never will. But I think that to do breed for the pure enjoyment and curiosity, and even education of the chameleon, then there is nothing to lose here. Even if the eggs don't hatch or even take 4-5 clutches of eggs before I have a success, then in the long run it is worth it and by then will have learned a great deal. But this all is just in my humble opinion!!!!