I would exercise caution with feeding that much protien to a chameleon. This could lead to a condition called gout. I personally have never used pinkies because of this concern. I would not think that feeding them on a less frequent basis would be bad. Veiled themselves have the widest variety diet of any of the chameleon that I know about. This would lead me to believe that they may have a some what more advanced digestive tract then some of the more strict insectivores.

Hey Kinyonga,

Yes my multivitamin contains Vit A, and betacartine among other things. I think the ratio that is of concern to me is of Vit A to Vit D to Vit E (and I don't remember the where these numbers came from, maybe Maders book) is 100:10:1.

As far as D3, I still haven't decided how much I'm going to use it. Since Manga is an adult, I have thought about using it every other calcium supplementation (every other week). He does not get any natural light, but I see him spend at least 45 minutes daily under his UVB bulb (<8" away). I figure (and I may be figuring wrong) he is getting what he needs with the UVB and regular calcium, BUT since secondary nutritional hyperparathyroidism is such a problem, and I don't have a reliable UVB sensor to see if there is UVB burnout, maybe I supplement every once in a while to keep the calcitriol levels on the high end of normal (whatever that is.)
I worry about supplementing it more than that since half-life of Calcitriol in a lot of animals is @ 72 hours. Since a reptiles metabolism is typically slower it may take longer to clear it from their system. If a reptile is colder that its optimal temperature level it may be even slower. For reasons stated before, I'm not so excited about oversupplementing.

How often should people supplement the growing and the pregnant? More often?....your guess is as good as mine.


As far as pinkies...some people swear by them...on the other hand if you are giving them for calcium supplementation, remember that these babies have incomplete skeletons- there bones are primarily cartilagenous precursers to bone, so are not so high in calcium. If the pinkie has just nursed, this may be gut-loaded with more calcium... I personally think that chameleons are insectivores and may only occassionaly have access to mammals in the wild. Variety is good, but I'd stick with a higher variety of insects.

Matthew

Can you comment more on why the vitamin E levels bother you, please?

Its definitely not easy to stay within "normal" (whatever that is, as you said) ranges for supplements. I would like to think that if the animal lives a long healthy life, can produce healthy babies that also live long healthy lives that whatever is being done for that animal must be somewhat "normal".

(Now I'm going to look up vitamin E to see what I can find out about it!)

Thank you Dr. Wheelock for your review of supplimentation, Vitamins and their function. Is there a good resource to find research on these topics or is anyone actually done it yet.

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0.2.3 Jackson Xan.:1.0 montium:0.1 bearded dragons:0.0.2iguana:

That last post did not sound right. What i mean is for example take several veileds from the same clutch and use different hour/types of light and no suppliment or use same lights and different suppliments and track next generation?? I know human research is generally lacking in quality when it comes to suppliments is chameleon research any better?
Thanks for all you input although i post little i read most of whats posted daily

Sean

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0.2.3 Jackson Xan.:1.0 montium:0.1 bearded dragons:0.0.2iguana:

Hello Dr. Wheelock. I'm a user of spanish chameleon forums a bit confuse lately about some aspects in the chameleon care. I never had to look in English forums, but now, I need more answers and I'll try to make an extra effort to write and read in English.

When talking about dusting the crickets for example, do you dust all of them? or just some of them?
When talking about Calcium, are you talking about a special calcium made for reptiles? or can be calcium carbonate??
When talking about Multivitamin, are you talking something like "reptivite"?

Thanks for your time and sorry for my English.

Toni.

My dusting protocol would be all the insects that one day would be lightly dusted (put into a bag with the calcium with D3) and given a good shake.
Crickets clean themselves off pretty quick so you would want to dust right before you feed.

Calcium carbonate is correct- you are looking for phosphorus free, so a reptile brand would probably be the safest bet. Remember, you can safely give calcium by itself 2-3 times a week, but it is the D3 that needs to be regulated.

Reptivite, herpivite,... there are a lot of multivitamins out there. Some better researched than others. I think that there is a tendency to oversupplement. I'm a big believer in giving more of a variety of feeders and giving the feeders more of a variety of veggies and grains themselves.

Good luck,
Matthew

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Matthew Wheelock, DVM
Dilworth Animal Hospital, Charlotte NC (704) 808-7387

Dr. Wheelock, awesome info! One thing I am wondering about is if the Wild Eyed Reptile gutload has any D3 in it (in the form of bone meal)? Also, I know your write up is about reptiles in general, but I have noticed that many of my gravid females tend to stay in the foliage after the first week and a half or two, that would mean that the calcium and multivitamins would increase in their bodies yet the D3 would not. Their requirements for calcium and D3 are already increased with the stress of eggs, let alone without as much UVB (from being in the foliage). Stacey mentioned that not only do growing children require more D3 than the common recommendation but so do aging adults, could this pertain to chameleons as well?

Thanks again for all your help Dr. Wheelock!!!

-Chris

Thank you Dr. Wheelock for your very informative recourse on calcium supplementation and the dreaded MBD. I hope that we hear more from you on various topics of interest regarding our chameleons.

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1.3 veileds and 72 eggs

Ok, thx Dr Wheelock. Let me share with all of you the schedules I've been using these last 2 years.

I've been doing this for more than one year:

Calcium carbonate 3-4 days per week in 2 feeders
Multivitamin twice a week in 2 feeders

Then, I started to use:

VIT-ALL in all the feeders all the days
MINER-ALL in all the feeders 3-4 days per week

Then, I moved to:

Reptivite twice per week in all the feeders
Calcium Carbonate twice per week in all the feeders
MINER-ALL twice per week in all the feeders

And finally, I'm doing:

Reptivite 4 days per week in all the feeders

All these schedules have been recomended by breeders, so, that's why I'm confuse...