A few plant questions

[bsparker33]

I have a female veiled (Milli) that is about four months old and I just got a 24x24x48 lllreptiles screen enclosure to replace her small glass reptarium. I would like to make sure I have the proper plants in her new home to reduce the risk of plant related issues. My questions are:

1: Will any of the species of approved plants work? many have mentioned Ficus benjamina for example. Do I need to look for that specific ficus or will any ficus be ok (i.e. ficus altissima? Shefflera Arbicola or Shefflera Amate etc.)

2. If I purchase plants from say HEB or Lowes, and I do not know what they have done to them as far as pesticides or fertilizer, can I still use them and if so, what precautions do I need to take before placing them in her cage?

3. How do I know if the plants I have purchased contain mites or other bugs that may harm my Cham. Are there any products out there that can be used to kill bugs but will be harmless to chameleons (as a precaution before I put the plants in the cage)?

Any and all ideas are greatly appreciated.
Thanks

 

[reptilemancan]

I have a female veiled (Milli) that is about four months old and I just got a 24x24x48 lllreptiles screen enclosure to replace her small glass reptarium. I would like to make sure I have the proper plants in her new home to reduce the risk of plant related issues. My questions are:

1: Will any of the species of approved plants work? many have mentioned Ficus benjamina for example. Do I need to look for that specific ficus or will any ficus be ok (i.e. ficus altissima? Shefflera Arbicola or Shefflera Amate etc.)

2. If I purchase plants from say HEB or Lowes, and I do not know what they have done to them as far as pesticides or fertilizer, can I still use them and if so, what precautions do I need to take before placing them in her cage?

3. How do I know if the plants I have purchased contain mites or other bugs that may harm my Cham. Are there any products out there that can be used to kill bugs but will be harmless to chameleons (as a precaution before I put the plants in the cage)?

Any and all ideas are greatly appreciated.
Thanks

answer to Q1; no, genraly any ficus will do, but garden centers genraly sell the most common ones, and there the ones witch work the best but strickly speaking any ficus will do.

Q2- firstly ask if they have used pesesides, then good but if they have you have a choise, buy the plant and when you get home wash it in boiling water and then hang it upside down (if you can) with the leaves dangling in boiling water, then rinse of with cold and it should be ok, the other thing is not to buy the plant in the first place. this is what i do to any plant i buy even if they havnt had pestisides on just to make sure.

Q3-pick a very healthy looking plant wiht no chuncks taken out of the leaves and looks good, look under the leaves and make sure the is no black dots, or dots of any colour. just give the wholw plant a good look over and if it looks fine it should be alright!

hope this helps!

 

[bsparker33]

how do you boil the plants without hurting the plants? What if they are flowering plants? (hibiscus) do I need to do anything different with them?

 

[Malicious]

There are several running threads answering these questions, try the search feature.

Search:

-Safe plants
-Repotting/cleaning new plants

 

[bsparker33]

I had searched awhile but couldn't find exact answers to those questions. I appologize if I simply missed them as I know how frustrating it is when people post without searching first.

Any links to the answers that I might have missed?