Chameleon will not drink and is becoming increasingly weak :(

Yelloret

New Member
Hi everyone, I really hope someone can help :)
I am a new chameleon owner and have had a gorgeous 6 month old Amilobe Panther for a little under a month now, but in the last few days things really seemed to have taken a turn for him when previously everything seemed totally normal.
I have noticed he has not been drinking for the last few days and everything i try to do to stimulate his drinking does not seem to work at all.
I've had a dripper on almost all day, but he doesn't seem to drink from anywhere in the enclosure. I've tried the shower method, but he hates it and wants to leave at all times, never thinking about the water. I ordered pipettes off amazon, but no matter how long I drip them in front of him, he will not drink. I've tried misting him many more times with lukewarm water per day so there is always plentiful water on the leaves, but no luck. Putting so much water into his watertight enclosure that it has now began to leak at the front causing its own problems.
Anyway.
He has a basking spot of 29.5 - 30.2 degrees celsius during the day and an ambient temperature of 24-26 in the enclosure.
A 24W 6% UVB bar which cover the length of the enlosure, but there are plenty of shaded spots.
His appetite has been very up and down for a while now, sometimes he will eat 2-3 hoppers and 4-5 crickets and a waxworm. And other days it's a struggle to get him to eat mre than 3 or 4 crickets.
His eyes are becoming more and more sunken each day and his skin more wrinkled, along with slowing in his movement as he was extremely lively and was usually happy to leave the enclosure, not an agressive panther at all.
His poo trends have becoming strange too, initially very healthy, dark with white urate. But now he has quite liquid excriment, and still quite a yellowish tinged or sometimes orange dehydrated looking urate. (It looks whiter than it is in the enclosed images)
All his livefood is well gutfed on greens, carrots and bug grub and regularly checked for unhealthy specimens which are removed. I either feed him by tongs or potfeed now to monitor how much he is eating by day.
He lives in a Viva+ bioactive enclosure, which I am now going to unplant and simply put potted plants in, cleaning out all the substrate so he can more easily hunt without food hiding and so I can add a better drainage system
One of the glass doors smashed when I was cleaning them, so he has a plastic cover over one half, (which could be stressing him out or confusing him) which I will be replacing with a mesh door, as I'm thinking the ventilation may not be good enough, despite the fact the enclosure is custom, with vents cut in the ceilings of the wooden panel so all light fittings are on the top shining through, with two layers of mesh, one inside and one outside the enclosure.
I've attached photos of him, the enclosure, and his excriment to see if that can help with detailing as I'm now just really worried about him. :(
I hope someone can help as i would really appreciate it.
Thanks so much,
Yelloret
 

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Are you sure he's only 6 months old?

Is water laying stagnant in the bottom of the cage? Is it smelling?
Is the cage all wood and glass...no ventilation?
 
Are you sure he's only 6 months old?

Is water laying stagnant in the bottom of the cage? Is it smelling?
Is the cage all wood and glass...no ventilation?
According to the seller he was 5 months old when I got him, which would make him roughly 6 months, possibly 6 and a half now. There isn’t stagnant water at the bottom of the Vivarium, which I have now unplanted and put a drainage hole in. The glass door and sheet are getting replaced fully by a mesh sheeting tomorrow morning when the mesh arrives as I was worried about ventilation, would that be enough? As I live in England I worry about maintaining humidity in his Vivarium.
 
Well his eyes don’t look too sunken to me. So that’s a good sign. His unrates. In the first photo looked white on the end and then turned orangey on ends. Which can be normal. As long as 90percent of it is white your Ok. pale Orange is okay for few days just keep checking. If urates are dark orange and eyes are sunken deep Then it’s a hydration issue
Chameleons can be extremely shy drinkers. Especially If it’s fairy new. It took my chameleon 2 years to drink in front of me. And his biggest drinking source, is when I mist the mesh and the water bubbles into the mesh. for some reason he recognizes that as water immediately And will come over right away n drink.
so he could be drinking and you just don’t see it, but i would def get that mesh on the front of that when you can. Would be good for air exchange anyway.
 
According to the seller he was 5 months old when I got him, which would make him roughly 6 months, possibly 6 and a half now. There isn’t stagnant water at the bottom of the Vivarium, which I have now unplanted and put a drainage hole in. The glass door and sheet are getting replaced fully by a mesh sheeting tomorrow morning when the mesh arrives as I was worried about ventilation, would that be enough? As I live in England I worry about maintaining humidity in his Vivarium.
Good that you're making changes that will make things better!
I was asking the questions to eliminate things that might be causing any problems.
 
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