Ali is 194g!!?? x

[jadeladine]

Hi all,



I just weight my little love Ali. She weighs 194g! She is approx. 6 and a half inches long. Lady who i bought her off said she is approx. 10 months old. What can you tell me about that?



She doesnt look gravid, no lumps in her belly, but i could be wrong. I have a tub in her viv just in case. She is deffo ready to breed, she is always a really dark brown colour, apart from at night when she goes light green.



Is she just chubby or ok for her size/age? Could she be older than 10 months?



Pick i just took when she was climbing the stairs for a bit of excercise. Funny enough, she was having none of it!

Thanks,



Jade

 

[VeiledOwner87]

Hi all,

I just weight my little love Ali. She weighs 194g! She is approx. 6 and a half inches long. Lady who i bought her off said she is approx. 10 months old. What can you tell me about that?


She doesnt look gravid, no lumps in her belly, but i could be wrong. I have a tub in her viv just in case. She is deffo ready to breed, she is always a really dark brown colour, apart from at night when she goes light green.


Is she just chubby or ok for her size/age? Could she be older than 10 months?

that constant dark colour doesnt look nor sound good to me, thats showing some major stress of some sort. for 6.5'' she doesnt look it, my kiwi is about that 6.5-7.5'' and she only going on 8 months. she doesnt show gravid colours, but there maybe something thats really irritating her colour. does she have gravid patterns when she sleeps?. reason i say she perhaps may be heavily stressed is because when she sleeps she is perfectly green. i would suggest her temps may be too cold, but thats nonsence if she looks perfectly fine at night with the temp drops.

please fill out the help form below:
Chameleon Info:
Your Chameleon - The species, sex, and age of your chameleon. How long has it been in your care?
Handling - How often do you handle your chameleon?
Feeding - What are you feeding your cham? What amount? What is the schedule? How are you gut-loading your feeders?
Supplements - What brand and type of calcium and vitamin products are you dusting your feeders with and what is the schedule?
Watering - What kind of watering technique do you use? How often and how long to you mist? Do you see your chameleon drinking?
Fecal Description - Briefly note colors and consistency from recent droppings. Has this chameleon ever been tested for parasites?
History - Any previous information about your cham that might be useful to others when trying to help you.

Cage Info:
Cage Type - Describe your cage (Glass, Screen, Combo?) What are the dimensions?
Lighting - What brand, model, and types of lighting are you using? What is your daily lighting schedule?
Temperature - What temp range have you created (cage floor to basking spot)? Lowest overnight temp? How do you measure these temps?
Humidity - What are your humidity levels? How are you creating and maintaining these levels? What do you use to measure humidity?
Plants - Are you using live plants? If so, what kind?
Placement - Where is your cage located? Is it near any fans, air vents, or high traffic areas? At what height is the top of the cage relative to your room floor?
Location - Where are you geographically located?

Current Problem - The current problem you are concerned about.


Pictures are helpful




other than that, unless she is a fat little cham, her arms and legs look a little swollen, her eyes (from what i can see) look well though, and her colour realy worries me.


-Phil

 

[jadeladine]

Ide just weighed her so she was pretty pissed off! She's not normally that dark unless i handle her (not often). She's a lot lighter in her viv, sometimes green.

Just concerned that she's too heavy. Is there such thing as a cham diet??

 

[VeiledOwner87]

she is deffinatly a cham with a "dont touch me" personality then. i would really appriciate you filling out that help form. EVERYONE dreds doing it! lol i feel you, but its important. i am leaving very shortly, so i want you to fill that out, but while i'm here, what is her diet consist of? and what is your supplimentation schedual?

 

[pssh]

Are you sure she's a she? She looks male to me. And 194 at 6.5 inches snout to vent sounds way over weight. My male who is 7-7.5 inches snout to vent is only 140. Post some pics of the lighter colors.

 

[jadeladine]

Ok here we go:

Your Chameleon - Female vieled cham, low pied. Approx. 10 months old, been with me for 1 month.
Handling - I have handled her twice in 1 month. Once to put her in viv, month later to weigh her. She's not too happy with handling but she doesn't bite.
Feeding - She wont eat locusts, only crickets! She has tried meal worms but didnt finish the rest. She wont take any wax worms off me, probably best anyway. Previous owner fed her all she could eat, which was 8-15 crickets a day. I tend to feed her 4 in the morning and 4 at night. Crickets eat lettuce and bug grub.
Supplements - Calcium dust, cant remember brand, and nutribol. every evening feed gets dusted with calcium 5 times a week, vits twice a week.
Watering - I hand spray 3 times a day. Ive never seen her drink but i dont stand there watching her. Ive only seen her eat once but her food has always gone.
Fecal Description - brown with white urates.
History - Not really.
Cage Info:
Cage Type - It is a plastic modified Herbtek enclosure that she lived in before, i bought it with her. It has glass doors. Its roughly 100cm wide and 170cm high. Real and fake plants, plenty to climb on
Lighting - Dont know brands without going upstairs, but its a basking lamp on a dimmer stat and a 5.00 UV light less than 2 months old. lights on for 12 hours a day.
Temperature - Temps are roughly 95 in basking corner, down to 75 at bottom of viv. Drops to 65/70 at night.
Humidity - maintained by misting 3 times a day and have real plants. Not measured but fine.
Plants - Unbrella plants.
Placement - Upstairs in corner. No fans, air vents, or high traffic areas.
Location - UK, Runcorn?

Current Problem - That she weighs 194g and doesn't seem to be gravid. Is she ok or do i need to put her on a diet??

 

[jadeladine]

Shes deffo a she...

 

[jadeladine]

Pic of her in day time as soon as she comes out of viv. The above pics ide just weighed her so she was NOT happy. Viv in background.

This is her mid way to changing to brown cos i was taking pics.

xxx

 

[jadeladine]

p.s. i dont have the water bowl, that was how viv was before i had her. Its been taken out now x

 

[bradleymarky]

looks like you have 2 vivs side by side, or is it one, if it is 2 do you have them covered so they cant see each other (just a guess)

 

[VeiledOwner87]

Ok here we go:

Your Chameleon - Female vieled cham, low pied. Approx. 10 months old, been with me for 1 month.
Handling - I have handled her twice in 1 month. Once to put her in viv, month later to weigh her. She's not too happy with handling but she doesn't bite.
Feeding - She wont eat locusts, only crickets! She has tried meal worms but didnt finish the rest. She wont take any wax worms off me, probably best anyway. Previous owner fed her all she could eat, which was 8-15 crickets a day. I tend to feed her 4 in the morning and 4 at night. Crickets eat lettuce and bug grub.
Supplements - Calcium dust, cant remember brand, and nutribol. every evening feed gets dusted with calcium 5 times a week, vits twice a week.
Watering - I hand spray 3 times a day. Ive never seen her drink but i dont stand there watching her. Ive only seen her eat once but her food has always gone.
Fecal Description - brown with white urates.
History - Not really.
Cage Info:
Cage Type - It is a plastic modified Herbtek enclosure that she lived in before, i bought it with her. It has glass doors. Its roughly 100cm wide and 170cm high. Real and fake plants, plenty to climb on
Lighting - Dont know brands without going upstairs, but its a basking lamp on a dimmer stat and a 5.00 UV light less than 2 months old. lights on for 12 hours a day.
Temperature - Temps are roughly 95 in basking corner, down to 75 at bottom of viv. Drops to 65/70 at night.
Humidity - maintained by misting 3 times a day and have real plants. Not measured but fine.
Plants - Unbrella plants.
Placement - Upstairs in corner. No fans, air vents, or high traffic areas.
Location - UK, Runcorn?

Current Problem - That she weighs 194g and doesn't seem to be gravid. Is she ok or do i need to put her on a diet??

wowow many things wrong here.

i suggest the previous owner didnt treat her too well, or handled her all too much. if she is mostly a dark colour and even darker when handled, she may have some bad memory issues. you may never change this, but the amount you are handling her is fine. just let her climb in her cage or free range on a tree, but dont handle her just for her to walk up the stairs lol

the previous owner catered her a buffet every single day, which is absolutely ubsured. chameleons past the age of 6-7 months do NOT need to eat everyday. 15 max is alot. you never want to over feed a female veiled, unless you have the exception of her being FERTILY gravid. over feeding her when she has not bred will lead to an excessive amount of infertil eggs, the more she develops, the harder and more stressfull it will be for her to lay, even a small clutch is stressfull on any female chameleon, not just veileds. 6-7 months -a 12-14 months, everyother day 7-9 feeders is appropriate. give her a variety. (supers, crickets, meals, wax, silks, roaches.... and so on) do your research to find the nutritional value of the insects. fatty feeders such as wax worms may be feed once or twice a week.

for suppliments, i suggest all rep-call brands. both calcium and calcium D3 are both phosphorus free. which when properly dusted with feeders balances the phos:calcium ratio. your supplimentation schedual is also very high. you do not need to dust everysingle day with calcium, and you deffinatly are not supposed to dust with vitamins twice a week. a more appropriate would be dust with plain calcium (lightly) every feeding which i hope will be changed to every other day. calcium D3 about once every 3-4 weeks. and vitamins the same about once every 3-4 weeks.

you must gut load your crickets with exceptional ingredients. Sandrachameleon has amazing blogs about gut loads. but "cricket grub" and lettuce wont do anything. feed them a variety of fresh fruits and veggtables (find out what are safe and nutritional) along with a dry food gut load (oats, bee polen, chicken feed, grain). and change the gut load veggies every 3-4 days, keep an eye on fruits daily to avoid mold. you never want to feed chameleon insects who have been eating moldy food.

you live in the UK so a terrarium based enclosure is fine. it should be atleast 2x2x 3.5' - 4'. with a screened vented top.

have you researched your real plants before putting them in? common plants are hibiscus, ficus, scheffleras (umbrellas) pothos and drecenias. you must also prep the plants up, thorughly washing the leaves free from any pesticides, repotting with organic soil, or replacing the top half of soil with substrate then with river bed rocks.

your temps are slightly high. on a very warm day some may not be able to get away from 90 degress plus temperatures in the basking spot. but basking spot should reach a max of about 87-90 degress f. with an ambient tempurature in other parts of between 75-85. humidity should be given to atleast 50-60% with each spray, as long as it is drinking, you will not need to worry so much of humidity drops. veileds can tolerate that. at least two heavy long mistings a day.

you need to be aware of the products you are using, you need to invest in a 5.0 uvb flourecent tube by either zoo med (reptiSUN 5.0) or buy exo-terra (reptiGLO 5.0)
you may substitute a basking bulb with a regular household bulb, or even a growbulb to heat the bask area as well as help your plants grow, you shouldnt need anything more than a 60W. but trial and error, you may need to play around with different wattages to achieve your target temp.

you SHOULD monitor your humidity with a digital or even analog meter, you cannot just bassed on "its fine", that sounds very careless of a keeper to assume. no offence.

the low traffic is good, but just because you live in the UK i would still put a air fan or something to help circulate a little better in the room


conclusion. you NEED to have all the right proper husbandry immediatly. it may be some risky spending, but well worth it and essential in the time of keeping her in captivity. regardless if you think she is gravid or not, PROVIDE a laying bin in her cage. 6-8" ATLEAST with moist play sand. get that chubb cake on a every other day diet. when she older than 13 months you may feed her every two days (3 times a week) keeping her supplimenting schedual the same. shes fat fat fat, but very pretty. again her dark colours may be an upsett somewhere in her life time



whewwww that was a lot, i hope this realy helps.

-Phil

 

[jadeladine]

wowow many things wrong here.

get that chubb cake on a every other day diet. when she older than 13 months you may feed her every two days (3 times a week) keeping her supplimenting schedual the same. shes fat fat fat, but very pretty.
-Phil

To be far, my info sheet was very brief and most of the things you talked about, i actually do. My light is a 5.00 reptiGLO and i use the rep-call calcium. Im not careless, i know how to look after my pets!

I say i have an unbrella plant, you say have you reserched your plant and then sau umbrella plants are good?? When people specifically ask for advice, its a bit full on cutting and pasting a care sheet! I feel like you've just insulted me to be fair. "No offence".

But anyway, thanks for the above advise, I will put chubby Ali on a every other day diet from today, hopefully she will loose a bit of timber and not be too cross with me for it.

Jade

 

[VeiledOwner87]

i didnt mean to offend you at all, and one thing you have to understand is, when you ask for help, expect constructive critacism. i didnt copy and paste a caresheet actually. i sat down for a good 30-40 minutes explaining everything carefully. ive spent the last year and thousands of hours researching veileds and other chameleons non stop, dealing with a gravid veiled who just passed away at the vets and raising a female veiled for the last 5-6 months. so in other words, when something doesnt look right, i will tell you straight up. im not a mr. know-it-all, and im not full of pride, im ALWAYS opened to the criticism and 2 cents of other experienced keepers to broaden my knowledge. i never said you were careless, but the fact that you said you dont monitor humidity, but its fine, is a careless statement to say. i dont care if the animal would do fine at 10% humidity, it is still professional and proper to monitor it.

im glad and happy to hear alot of the stuff i mentioned you do, thats very good and no im not throwing sarcasim out. just one thing with reptiles in captivity is .. research never ends. i hope my advice does help, and again i didnt mean to offend you, im here to help. i love everybody's chameleons like their my own and i dont enjoy seeing anything live under stress or illness. you can pm me or keep posting this thread for more questions..

again, im not saying at all you are doing a bad job, ive already told you that you were doing good, but there were alot of things wrong, and i have a feeling there was some neglection or carelessness with the last keeper.

kapeesh? friends? lol

 

[VeiledOwner87]

and also too, about the umbrella plant, i didnt see that you had that down untill i was done posting lol. i was also going to harp on you about the enclosure untill i seen you were in the UK so my mistake lol

 

[GooglezNvincent]

You might want to take her in to a vet. She may just be overweight, but it could be edema and or gout, with how big her neck region is and her limbs.

 

[jadeladine]

Update

Hi,

Just a quick update! Ali has gone from 194g to 168g!! Well done Ali, she's slimmer of the month! She still hasnt reached goal just yet.

A little piccy of when she's sleeping as she's so cute.

Jade

 

[Miss Lily]

Well done Jade! I know how hard it is to cut down on their food and feed every other day. I have been doing the same with Amy and she is now down to 171g from 186g. I thought enough was enough when she weighed more than Tommy! I guess the British females are just bigger girls! Ali is a beauty!

 

[jadeladine]

Thanks. It is hard, i feel horrible for doing it. But she's alot more active now and looks healthier so its for the best x

 

[Leedslad88]

Hi Jade,

I think some of the people on here dont appreciate that keeping chams is a little different in the UK to the USA (temp, humidity etc)

I would say that it sounds like you are doing OK. I perhaps would not use the calcium with Retibol as it already has a good amount of calcium. I would opt for the exo-terra multi vits once a week. I would invest in taking the time to look at gut-loading your feeders as this is VERY important.

I have kept mine this way for five years and they are doing just fine!

 

[Miss Lily]

I know it's hard, but I am now used to it - it also means that I can feed on days when I am home so I can handfeed them too! It's really worth it to see them looking better!