Carpet chameleon help

CarpetQueen · Aug 31, 2012

Hi! I'm really new to all of this!
I just got a carpet chameleon. He's about 7 months old.
I was wondering how long it took for chameleons to get used to you and like you. He never comes out and is scared when my hand is in the enclosure. He puffs up angrily and even snaps at my hand.
I'm really gentle and move really slowly but he won't climb onto my hand etc.
He has a nice enclosure, food and water etc. When he's in the tank he's happy so there's nothing wrong there.
He's just really angry and scared when I try to take him out. I know chameleons are easily stressed but it just feels like he hates me and I'm wondering if there's anything I could do?
Thank you

DavidBuchan · Aug 31, 2012

Hello, welcome to the forum

It is different for each cham, but in general they are not 'friendly' animals. I don't know how long you've had him but people mostly recommend to have at least a week of disturbing him as little as possible to get used to a new home. Then you can start to try and entice him to the door using crickets or worms. After a while he might be happy to walk out onto your hand. The more you 'chase' him the more scared he'll be so you have to be very patient with him. Some chams will never come around, and you'll have to treat them like tropical fish (ie. nice to look at but no handling

) Rest assured that he doesn't hate you though, he's just naturally very shy.........

kuskye25 · Sep 1, 2012

the only way i can get mine to climb on me naturally is i put my hand in front of her, and use a piece of food with my other hand to entice her to walk across my hand to get to the food in my other hand...

works almost everytime, and then she doesnt care that shes on me..

first try letting it get used to your hand by hand feeding it... then it will associate your hand with food eventually... once this happens the cham will trust you alot more...