Acting very weird....

[TheSaint]

Ok, to start off here is the info.


Cage Info:

* Cage Type - Screen terrarium, 18x18.5x24
* Lighting - Using ReptiGlo 5.0 and a 60 watt basking lamp. Turn on at 8am, off at 9pm
* Temperature - Basking spot is avg 82-85 degrees, cool spot around 72 degrees. Lowest overnight temp is around 67 measured with three digital thermometers/hygrometers.
* Humidity - Humidity ranges between 60-80%, mist 2-3 times daily, using live plants.
* Plants - Hibiscus, croton, scheferra
* Placement - Cage sits on top of a medium sized bookshelf. No vent/fans too close.
* Location - Houston Texas

Chameleon Info:

* Your Chameleon - Veiled chameleon, around 4-5 months old. been in my crae for 3 weeks.
* Handling - Handle her around twice a week, havent handled her in at least 4 days.
* Feeding - crickets, meal worms and small flies, crickets dusted with calcium w/o phos. meal worms and flies added every 3 days.
* Supplements - reptical, w/o phos. w/d3.
* Watering - dripper and mist 2-3 times daily.
* Fecal Description - brown and white
* History - Very friendly normally, very active. Was told she was a male when I bought her and ended up being a female. Not very well treated at petsmart.



Ok so now about what she is doing. Normally, if I put my hand in front of her she will get on my hand and be fine. Today however the moment I opened her cage she went crazy, running and hiding from me. I put my hand near her and she just kept backing up trying to get away so I stopped. That isnt really what bothers me so much...maybe she is just having a bad day, who knows. What bothered me is I cleaned her cage and took her plants out one by one and cleaned them also. I have replanted one of her plants in a pot and then put some sand over it to cover some of the larger pieces of dirt that she could ingest. I put it her cage and went to get the rocks I was washing to cover the sand. When I came back she was hanging upside down from some biovine attacking the sand with her tongue like she was catching bugs. i watched her for a minute and she just kept doing it. Could the sand hurt her? Ive covered it with rocks now, but still bothers me why she would do that. she is eating just fine and very quickly every morning. Im baffled.

 

[jannb]

Chameleons especially veildeds will eat all sorts of stuff. That's why it's so important to cover the soil and not have substrate in their homes. Your UV light is it a long bulb or a coil?

 

[laurie]

You might want to check but I am fairly sure that crotons are very bad for chams. The sap from the croton could have itched or sort of burned her skin. Also she should not be allowed to ever ingest sand. It can cause the cham to get impacted. So far that is all I can suggest.

 

[TheSaint]

You might want to check but I am fairly sure that crotons are very bad for chams. The sap from the croton could have itched or sort of burned her skin. Also she should not be allowed to ever ingest sand. It can cause the cham to get impacted. So far that is all I can suggest.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/plants/


It says that croton is ok here. This was why I bought it. As for the sand, it is covered now and today she is running around and seems to be doing great. Ate all her food very quick. I dont know what she was doing, but that was odd.

 

[TheSaint]

Chameleons especially veildeds will eat all sorts of stuff. That's why it's so important to cover the soil and not have substrate in their homes. Your UV light is it a long bulb or a coil?

The UV light is the long 18" now as I started with the compact and then realized it was not good for her eyes.

 

[chameleon97]

https://www.chameleonforums.com/plants/


It says that croton is ok here. This was why I bought it. As for the sand, it is covered now and today she is running around and seems to be doing great. Ate all her food very quick. I dont know what she was doing, but that was odd.

its a safe plant, but it has sap that causes itchy eyes. so does ficus.

 

[TheSaint]

Now, I was told that I should put in a pot full of sand for egg laying purposes in about a month. Should I be worried about her eating sand when I do this?

 

[jannb]

You have have a laying bin for her. Hopefully, she will not eat the sand.

 

[TheSaint]

Yeah, I guess that is what i am worried about. When I have a laying bin I would hate to see her eat sand. Seriously, who eats sand? C'mon! Anyways, is there something else I can use besides sand?

 

[chamelisa]

I don't usually provide a laying bin for larger chameleons until it's actually needed because they take up space and introduce a problem as you are describing, eating the sand or medium. I've tried different things over the years and for my small pygmy chams, I do provide a laying medium but it's part of the cage-scape.

Since your chameleon is so young, and you are feeding her some small feeders, I'm guessing she's rather small. Can you provide a photo of her and her enclosure? That really helps understand how things are set up.

Your hydration methods seem very adequate for a veiled. If she has any sand in her, it will likely pass through with the food and water. So keep doing what you're doing.

 

[TheSaint]

Yes, she is very small. Here is a picture of her about a week ago. It does seem like she has grown considerably in that week however, lol. I am also attaching a picture of her habitat. This was before I rearranged it added more biovine and changed thermometers/hygrometers, but you get the idea.

 

[sandrachameleon]

A small amount of sand will not hurt her assuming she is drinking well. She may grow out of the desire to eat sand.

I had a panther female that would eat try to sand (twigs, leaves, fingernails, eyeballs, anything that moved). But when she was ready to lay she forgot about food (the only time she forgot about eating) and didnt eat the sand.