Big, Bold & Beautiful! Meet my Melleri!

[rsepiphyte]

Took some pictures today of the Mellers. I removed the barriers so they can see each other. No signs of stress but they didn't eat. Will wait and see tomorrow if they feel comfortable eating in front of one another. Enjoy the pics! Slainte' Ruth

 

[coldbloodedAL]

They look great Ruth! May I ask how you are housing them? Any pictures?

 

[rsepiphyte]

Right now i have them in very simple screen cages that are 4' x 2' x 3'. Each enclosure has a large corn plant or rubber plant. In the front of the cages i have hung some plastic plants just to give them more cover. They have 3-4 large branches cut from my pin oak trees. The cages are next to one another but i have blinds between each that i can raise and lower and watch for their responses to one another. Once they can eat in front of each other i intend to let them free roam in a spare bedroom of mine. I have 4 48inch shop lights with two bulbs each and all have one basking light with a 100 watt incandescent bulb. Ambient temps during the day are between 70-73 degrees with basking light 85 degrees. I hand mist 4 times a day and are beginning to get them to take water from a syringe. They get a 1-2 hour "shower" 3 times a week. Humidity in the room itself is between 30 to 40 percent. They love crickets and blue bottle flies. I just recently introduced them to Dubia and they are beginning to like them, at first it was a no go. I also give them a few pinkie mice every other week that i inject with a multivit and trace elements. The pinkies are defrosted and when my super friendly Mellers open their mouths to greet me when it is shower time i just pop a few in. One thing i have noticed is they do not bask much and are very unhappy when the ambient temps go above 78 degrees. All are in quarantine for another month if fecals test negative again we will try free ranging. So far so good and they have a consistent weight gain from week to week. Time will tell if i can successfully get these guys to become acclimated to one another and breed. Probably more than you wanted to know but i am so fascinated with these guys. Slainte' Ruth

 

[coldbloodedAL]

The more the merrier! Thanks, I have also noticed mine rarely ever basks, once in a blue moon i catch her doing so but thats it.. She was a somewhat picky eater for the first month or so, but quickly warmed up to everything but hornworms(still working on that one). Best eater I have.

One thing I have found odd about mine, she does not prefer long showers. Which goes against everything i have heard about melleri. I started out with two to three half hour sessions daily but found she will drink and soak for the first five to ten minutes then move on to the dry area of her enclosure. So now she gets roughly fifteen minutes of misting daily and thats it.

 

[rsepiphyte]

Just a quick note that i am placing these Mellers up for sale. I have 1 male and 2 females that i would like to place in experienced keepers homes. Feel free to email me about them at [email protected] Slainte' Ruth

 

[spawn]

If you don't mind telling, why are you selling? Yours are gorgeous. The ones I got in came in in bad shape. One had a broken leg, and they both have messed up horns. But I have to say, my experience differed from yours. Mine are NOT easily stressed, and appear quite bold.

 

[rsepiphyte]

Thank you, these guys are really grand and i feel fortunate that they came in , in rather decent shape. I just need to scale back. I have some Bradypodium coming in soon and i find i enjoy the smaller species. Ruth

 

[bifidus]

I am breeding melleri (now it is F3 generation) and after my opinion CB are no more diffiicult to culture and breed like pardalis. They are active, "very intelligent" (suprisingly they remember for example very well where is "loophole" to escape). They are no aggressive and bring a lot of fun. My personal opinion is that they should be more widespread. Just one hint - there are many roach species they do not eat (I culture about 20 roach species so have material for testin) although they preferred food (except flies and soldier fly Hermetia) are Panchlora and other leaf roaches. But dubias they to not eat although Archimandrita same size yes. A bit mystery.

With imported animals I have had a lot of various problem but with next generation any. I lost my F2 parent animal due to "storm" - very strong wind, I never saw such in my life here, outside have fallen part of tree and destroy their cages so escaped and I did not found them living. Now I have just F3 but next year I hope I will have F4. My suggestion is buy CB melleri without fear, if you can keep alive pardalis you can melleri, too. But imported melleri thats roulette.