Doesnt use her tongue to eat

[sevarious]

my new cham has apparently never used her tongue and has ALWAYS been hand fed by her prior owner. she is about 8 months old. i know that not eating with her tongue can cause it to atrophy. is there any way to check? or more importantly, get her to start using her tongue?

 

[kinyonga]

Try holding the insect a little further away from her every few days to see if it will encourage her to use her tongue.

 

[sevarious]

i have not fed her yet. i just got her on saturday and the guy has been only feeding her mealworms. from reading on here they should be only used as treats so i went and got some small/med crickets and wanted to give them at least a day to gutload and will be trying to feed her tonight with a cup.

 

[sevarious]

im getting more concerned. she pretty much refuses to use her tongue. i got her saturday and she had eaten the night before so i waited till tonight and she will ONLY eat if i hold her still and she opens her mouth for me to put it in. other than that she will LITERALY walk over the foood ignoring it.

 

[carol5208]

are you positve that there is not something else going on with her tongue, like an injury or a prior supplement issue?

 

[sevarious]

according to the prior owner, he used d3 a coupel times a month and non d3 every feeding. he fed her by hand from the beginning. i see her tongue after i stick the cricket or worm in her mouth as she is using it to pull it down her throat but she wont reach out and grab anything... shes only had 3 crickets since saturday. i honestly do not know if that is enough food for her but i dont want to over feed her...

 

[kaylie]

I'm pretty sure 3 crickets in 3 days is underfeeding.

 

[sevarious]

thats what i was thinking but she doesnt seem to have an appetite...

 

[kaylie]

Yeah for now I only have some veiled cham experience, but I know that he can eat up to 15 quarter to half inch crickets everyday at 4 months old, but so far has not eaten more than 10 per day. So definitely feed more if she will take it. I've read that temps and other factors affect appetite. Search for your type of cham on here for right details and make sure you follow as close as you can. Also, maybe she doesn't like the cup. I tried that once and only got mine to eat 3 or 4, and as soon as I let the crickets free range he was all over them.

It seems strange though because my baby will pull his head back if a cricket is too close to him to use his tongue, he won't just bite. He HAS to use it. I thought they only resorted to feeding like that if they lost their tongue... maybe something is wrong?
For calcium, do w/o d3 every feeding, not every other. d3 2x a month. multi-vitamin 1-2 x a month.

 

[kaylie]

according to the prior owner, he used d3 a coupel times a month and non d3 every feeding.

Sorry, thought you said every other feeding, my mistake