Baby veiled sleeping all day?

Alright, I might get a less powerful uvb then.

I powder my crickets every time with http://www.aandersonphoto.com/Other/Roger/20925075_S8SGCt#!i=1664698328&k=DVxqjSs and I have apples/carrots/potatoes in with the crickets. They probably are too big though, I've been trying to only give him the smaller ones. He ate 2 1/2 inch and then 1 huge cricket yesterday and he hasn't eaten at all yet today. Is that bad? He's also been laying under some leaves with his eyes closed most of the day. I tried leaving his uvb off for an hour to see if he'd open his eyes but he didn't.

I don't know, this guy has multiple different kinds/ages/and sizes of chameleons and they all look really healthy and active.
 
You should use the following supplements:

Phosphorous free calcium without d3 at every feeding
Phosphorous free calcium with d3 twice a month
Multi-vitamin twice a month

Your current supplements are good for the twice a month dustings. You need to get calcium without d3 for daily use.

At 1 month old he should probably be eating 1/4 in crickets. If he's eating 1/2 in he will eat less. I'm not sure if feeding it crickets that are too big can cause any health problems.

I would search the forum for sandrachameleons blogs on gut loading. Potatoes provide nothing for the cham. I may be wrong but I believe apples have a too high phosphorous to calcium ratio.

I would also suggest more vines and foliage and again recommend removing the waterfall. Besides the cleaning issue, it would be easy for an unhealthy cham to fall in and drown.

I don't know, this guy has multiple different kinds/ages/and sizes of chameleons and they all look really healthy and active.
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It's a pet store. They're not going to put unhealthy animals on display. They also don't have them long enough to know if the way they are keeping them is correct or not. The pet store I go to usually has a good amount of healthy chams as well. That doesn't mean that they are keeping them properly but it's sufficient for the short time that they are there.
 
Alright, I didn't know that I'll get different vitamins for him tomorrow then.

I'll start feeding the crickets some different things too. My friend told me that phoenix worms have a good calcium ration or whatever, would you recommend that I give him some of those too?

Good idea with the more branches, I rearranged the ones he has a bit so that he could hide more and he seems to like being able to do that.

And yeah I guess I never know if any of them get sick at the store. I've been going there a couple times a week for the past month and he's had like 7 of the same ones that all look awesome. He also had an 8 month old one that he had raised from a baby and it looked good and was friendly.

Do you think that the 13w 10uvb bulb is still too bright for him? I could get a smaller one, I just don't want him to be keeping his eyes closed because they're sore from the light or anything. And also, would too much humidity make him have gunk in his eyes? I've been keeping it 75 degrees with 40-60% humidity. When I mist him he usually rubs his eyes on the branches a couple of times afterwards and he tends to keep his right eye closed and look around with his left more often.

Thank you for all the help! I'll get him better vitamins right away.
 
Today Roger has had his eyes closed almost the whole time. I even was poking him and holding him to try and get him to open them. He's been blindly waving his hands around in order to find branches. Sometimes there won't be any even close to him yet he doesn't open his eyes to find out. I tried misting him with warm water and I even held him in my hand and dropped water on his eyes and tried to rub them a bit to see if they were crusted shut or anything. Would this be because of his vitamins? lighting? or humidity?

Someone pleeeeeeease help
 
Pheonix worms are great to feed. high in calcium.
As for his eyes.
How far from his highest basking spot is it to the uvb bulb?

how far away is the basking bulb?

what uvb bulb are you using again?
 
Nice, I'll try to find some. I got him some mealworms just to see if those would interest him and to try and change up his diet a little.

The basking bulb and the uvb bulb are in a combo metal dome thing. He usually sits up in the left corner about 6-8 inches from the basking light and the uvb is about 5-6 inches to the right of the heat light. He was just trying to climb and hang directly under the basking light so I moved it cause I didn't want him to burn. I now have both lights in the middle of the top of his cage and then angled back a little bit so that the heat isn't as intense. He is now hanging upside down on his cage with his lower body under the lip of where the lights are. I have a 13w 10.0 uvb compact florescent light for him. I can take pics and put them up if that would help you guys understand what he's doing.

I also just put a ton more plants in his cage so that he has more places to hide. He's still waving his arms around blindly when he moves around though. I've misted him a few times and I even set him in his waterfall but he walked around the edge and then went up to the top of his cage.
 
Okay, I was just at the store today and I asked them specifically about that and they said the 10uvb should be completely fine, but a lot of people on here have said that's too bright so I might just go get a 5uvb one.

Here are some pics of him and how he's acting http://www.aandersonphoto.com/Other/Roger/20925075_S8SGCt#!i=1667146840&k=QNg2H2r

That pic is of him next to a zippo lighter to show how tiny he is. There are also pics of the lights that I have for him and of how he's hanging under the lights.

Thanks!
 
Aussie said:
Today Roger has had his eyes closed almost the whole time. I even was poking him and holding him to try and get him to open them. He's been blindly waving his hands around in order to find branches. Sometimes there won't be any even close to him yet he doesn't open his eyes to find out. I tried misting him with warm water and I even held him in my hand and dropped water on his eyes and tried to rub them a bit to see if they were crusted shut or anything. Would this be because of his vitamins? lighting? or humidity?

Someone pleeeeeeease help
Click to expand...

I hear you thre. My Senegal Cham had her eyes closed nearly the entire time today as well. But I really think she is sick more than anything else. It sounds like your light may have been the issue, because your Cham is at least somewhat active and eating, mine won;t even move. Try dabbing some saline eyewash on a q-tip and gently rubbing each one of Roger's eyes with it. I did this a week ago when my Cham wouldn't open her right eye and it helped her open it up. Good, luck, I'm rootin for your little buddy to make it. I know how frustrating it gets when they are not acting normal. The Cham I'm having trouble with is my very first Cham and she is giving me an ulcer from worry. I have her scheduled for a vet visit on Thursday morning so I hope she makes it that long.
 
Thank you for the advice! I tried dripping warm water on his eyes and gently rubbing them but that didn't do anything. When I mist him he keeps rubbing his eyes on the branches a couple times and then he just sits with them closed. I went back to the store I got him at and they said they think he may have a little cold or something because the first few days I had him my room was 65 during the night which they said was probably too cold since he's so small. They also said I could bring him in tomorrow and they'd look at him and try to help me get him feeling better which is really nice of them.

I took a temp of his basking spot at the top of his cage about 6-10 inches from his basking light and it was at 99.5 degrees. Is that too hot for him? and that temp was even with the lights tipped back a little bit.

Yeah its really frustrating how nothing I've done seems to work. He's more work than a human baby haha. Hopefully when I take him in tomorrow they'll be able to help me get him back on track. Good luck with your cham too, they're so cute when they're active and healthy!

Thank you for the suggestions! if his eyes aren't better soon I'll try the saline solution.
 
I'm at my friends for the next couple hours but I just had my mom check on him and she said he had his eyes open and that he's moving around! :D so that's a little bit of good news, at least he's not just sitting in one place and completely not moving like he was earlier today.
 
No problem! Glad to here his eyes are open and he's moving around! I bet it was the lights 10.0 was probably to bright. I read the veileds should go no lower than 68 at night, and basking should not be higher than 95 so the 99 reading your getting is probably too hot. May want to bump the light wattage down or find a way to suspend the light higher off the top of the enclosure. Thanks for the support on my Cham. She was acting a lot better tonight. Moved a little, opened her eyes some but she is still obviously very sick. I did get her to drink a lot of water. I enticed her by misting her with hot ( not boiling) water. She really, really enjoyed that and began drinking. I have been trying to mist with room temp water and she just flips out and tries to get away....way too cold, especially if she's basking and has her body temp up to 85. I don't what I was thinking in the past.
Vet on Thursday morning, fingers crossed
Keep us updated on Roger!!
 
Dolp! sorry about the mis-info on the basking temp. I guess I was looking at adult temps. I just saw 99 and freaked a little. I knew that was too hot for sure.
 
Yeah I haven't gotten a different light yet but i think the angling of them helped him avoid the direct uvb lighting. Alright I'll wire the light up a little bit more and that will probably help it be cooler. And yeah it did seem too hot, but he was sitting way up at the top of his cage so he seemed to like it that hot. Are there any negative effects of having it be too hot? I'd think if he was too hot he'd just sit lower but I don't know.

That's awesome! Yeah roger opened his eyes and moved about for a bit but then went back to shutting them, but at least they were opening. Earlier he wouldn't even open them to climb around. And yeah when I mist him with room temp water he runs away as fast as he can haha. so I've been heating water up in the microwave so that its pretty hot/steaming and by the time its misted its really warm still and he seems to like this more and he doesn't run away as much. I still haven't seen him drinking but I have heard that they're kind of shy about drinking in front of people, I've just been trying to keep his leaves pretty moist so that he can have some when he wants.

Thank you both for the useful info, hopefully he'll be feeling better tomorrow. :)
 
Hey I've kind of been following your thread here.
I didn't put my 2 cents in the first day because you indicated lowering the temp helped, so I said OK, sounds like that worked.

I've produced quite a few baby veileds over the years, and have some experience with eyes closing on babies like this. I've bred veileds for 20 years and produced thousands in that time- I produced quite a few back in the 1990s. I'm telling you that up front because I'm about to contradict some of the advice you have been given in this thread. But I'm doing so speaking from experience.

Nearly every time when it was with my babies back in the beginning, the problem could be traced back to not enough supplementation. Either d3 or multivitamin (a or e most likely the culprits). Once I figured that problem out fairly early on, the problem went away.

Babies under 5" in length are especially susceptible, and if your baby is smaller than 3 or 4" really it is small enough that things like shipping and handling from the breeder to the distributor to the pet store can be really hard on it nutritionally as it undergoes periods of fasting and probably poor supplementation and poor feeding as well at a time when it has some very high demands for rapid growth being put on it's system.

I do not believe it is a problem with the temperature. I raise my babies under the same temperatures as my adults and they thrive- rapid growth, strong bones, great behavior and feeding. My basking temps are well into the 90s (possibilities for even warmer) and night temps can drop as low as 50 without problems and I use these temps even for babies born that day if that is what my temps happen to be that time of year.

It isn't your temps. I would be very surprised if it was your tube either. Unless the lighting in your cage is very dim so the pupils aren't contracting when exposed to the UVB.

Most likely your cham needs a little supplementation for several days to get it back on track nutritionally.

What I found that worked best for me in the days when I was figuring this stuff out- mist your chameleon first so he gets his eyes open and drinks. Then immediately offer it several supplemented insects. Try calcium with d3 first, and if that doesn't do the trick, multivitamin the next time, followed by more calcium with d3 the next couple feedings, then the multivitamin again.

This isn't a permanent schedule- it is only until your cham gets it's eyes open and behaving normally. As soon as that happens, go to whatever advice you wish to follow that you get here on the forums about supplementation schedule and you should be fine. My preference is calcium with d3 a couple times a week and multivitamin 1x per week until growth starts to slow, then d3 1x per week and multivitamin 1x per 2 or 3 weeks when I think of it, and no d3 all summer when my lizards are outside. But there are other schedules that work well for other people. Or you might simplify by using the rapeshy all in one product every feeding.

The point is- the first thing I would do is the above. The next guess would be illness from stress and warehousing where it could pick up parasites or something else. But I think the supplementation much more likely ...
 
And the golden rule to follow is no handling or messing with more than absolutely necessary until behavior is normal...
 
Thank you so much!!! I've been wondering if it was the vitamins because the first couple times I didn't dust his crickets and usually they're free in his cage for a while before he eats them. I started gut loading the crickets better and I got mealworms too. I'll make sure to give him freshly coated crickets from now on. It's just been really frustrating because I have everything set up how I think it should be and it's the exact same set up the guy in the store uses for all of his chameleons. But now that you specifically mention the supplementation that makes complete sense because that was the one thing I hadn't really been concentrating on, I was more focused on just making sure he was at least eating something. I'll give him a bunch of crickets tomorrow that are powdered really well and he will hopefully be much better in a few days.

I also picked him up from the store the day he was shipped, so he was only there for a couple hours. That might be another reason he's having trouble settling in.

And yeah I try to leave him alone and not hold him unless I'm trying to hand water him or look at him closer.

Thank you very much for the help, I hope this gets him back on track. :D :)
 
Yeah- that's the key- get the eyes open from misting and make sure the supplements are on a few fresh crickets. Don't leave undusted ones around for him to eat until he is behaving normally for a few days.

Also- you may have picked him up at the store right away, but he was probably shipped and fasted the previous day, and there is no way to know how well he fed at the wholesalers after being fasted for shipping from the breeder to the wholesaler, nor any way to know if he was eating supplemented insects at the wholesaler either. I think you inherited the problem. But not supplementing once you did wasn't helping.
 
Yeah I'll definitely get right on the dusting, I got more vitamins today, calcium without d3 but I'll keep giving him the calcium with d3 until he's acting more normal.

And he was a lot more active when I got him but I got him last thursday and at the last second I had to go away for the weekend for a photography job and my mom had to look after him so he probably wasn't getting all his vitamins.

Would you recommend that I take him into the store tomorrow so they can look at him? They offered to take a look at him and see if they could help. or should I just leave him in his cage and supplement him well the next few days and if he's not better take him in then?
 
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