Chameleons are what they eat ?

[TiffanyMariexo]

So some guy doing a reptile viewing says that some foods can alter the color of your chameleon. For example he states that horned worms can make them have more blue in their color. To me he sounds like a complete quack because I couldn't find anything online. Anyone ever hear of such ?

 

[RAFASTAR23]

Hello there!
Chameleons can change their color because of a very complex cell system. Beneath it's transparent skin are several cell layers which contain pigments. We also have pigments which cause our skin to darken in the sun. By opening and closing cells called melanophores, chameleons change their skin color. The cells direct sun to specific pigments which reflects the light back in different colors.
That being said, the pigments themselves can be (to a certain extent) be more concentrated or less concentrated depending on nutritional factors, genetics, and sun exposure.

 

[PhoenixFeather]

yeah diet can affect color to a certain extent. The catch is that you'd have to be feeding pigments that don't get broken up during digestion AND eventually end up in the someplace that's visible from the outside. For example, in humans pigments that make their way to the blood stream can change the apparent color of skin depending on how pale and translucent the person is to start with. I would imagine that with chameleons the pigments would have to be somewhere very close to or in the epidermis since they have such heavy pigmentation already that you cant see down to deeper layers or the circulatory system.

The only substances in food I know of that can change apparent skin color are carotenoids. They turn human and lots of other animal skin/feathers/scales orange, pink, or yellow because they don't get broken down very well by most animals and get deposited in skin, fat, and other organs through the bloodstream. (think flamingos) They are the reason that body fat is usually yellowish colored. They are often used in foods that claim to increase color, like tropical fish food or those orange cricket food cubes. However even if they could noticeably impact the color of a heavily pigmented animal like a chameleon, I wouldn't recommend it because it would tint all the non-orange parts too and be really weird :/ (look up carotenosis)

And about the hornworms... somehow I doubt that the pigment in hornworms would last through the digestive process to get deposited in the skin. The pigment is called an insecticyanin (insect + cyan. get it?) that's found in their hemolymph (the circulatory fluid of insects). It is a protein, and I think animal digestive systems are usaully pretty good at breaking down proteins but idk. Interestingly enough, in the wild hornworms are green because of the interaction between this blue pigment and the yellow pigment found in their natural diet. So what is the source of this yellow? You guessed it, it's carotenoids

Anyway, I think you were right to dismiss this dude as a quack. anybody who makes broad claims like that without getting into the biochemistry behind it and molecular differences can probably be ignored