Doing my homework -

wavingsnail

Established Member
Hey guys and gals, I've been lurking here for about two months, really enjoying all of your pictures and posts.

I've been keeping herps on and off for the past eighteen years. Mostly varanids in foster situations, however I have always really wanted a chameleon, but just never felt like I was ready for such a delicate creature (varanids, while potentially dangerous, are pretty much just walking garbage disposals that are generally pretty mistake-tolerant...huge difference, haha).

Anyway, I've already decided that I'm going to be purchasing a male nosy be panther in the next few months, but before I take the plunge I need to ask a few questions here and there...I'll try to limit myself on this initial post for all of our sakes (already sort of long winded, huh?) -

1: I'm going to go with the Xl breeder series from dragon strand - this has a screen door and top, but the sides and back are solid pvc - I plan on using "great stuff" on the back and sides to help create a "natural" heavily planted/living enclosure, but the solid sides go against almost everything I know about chameleons. Have any of you used this series of enclosure with success? The one benefit to the solid sides is that I live in the central valley of California, which is very hot (triple digit summers) and dry, so I'm assuming i would be fighting an uphill battle during the summer with our near constant air conditioner use drying out an all screen enclosure. Thoughts?

2: Part of my "living enclosure" idea includes a dragon strand substrate tray with a carpet of baby tears growing in it corner to corner - I figured I'd add springtails/isopods and an earthworm or two to the soil as the baby tears grow to work as my cleanup crew. I did this when I had a breeding trio of horned mt dragons years ago, but am unsure of how practical it would be in this situation. I would give the baby tears and other enclosure plants/flowers a month or two to establish themselves before introducing the Chan, btw.

3: Drainage! I figured I would drill around 10-20 small holes in the substrate tray (which would have a layer of bio balls on the bottom) to facilitate excess water draining into the bucket sitting in the stand below the enclosure, does this sound right? I'm also wondering if I can use a 5 gallon bucket as a combination water catcher AND reservoir for whatever misting system I go with. I've read in a couple of places that any solid debris that falls in will either sink to the bottom or float on top - so as long as your intake sits more or less in the middle you should be able to avoid raining down solids on your Cham or clogging your lines. I'm also optimistically hoping that the combination of baby tears, good soil and my clean up crew will do a good job of filtering any water being "recycled" in my bucket, that being said, I still fully intend on changing the water out, just hoping to be able to do it on a less frequent schedule as I am a prison nurse and work several sixteen hour shifts a week, and as a result tend to be pretty tired during my work week. Let me know what you think.

So...that's it. For now. Sorry about the wall of text and any formatting issues or typos, I did this all via mobile.

Thanks for reading and any advice you may have, looking forward to being an active member!
 
I know it was a long post, but I'm a little bummed that it's a week later and I've got no replies.

Anyone care to chime in? Really want to have things up and running the RIGHT way.

Thanks.
 
@wavingsnail Sorry this one slipped through! Sometimes, if its a busy few days, new posts get lost. I'll look through your thread above and respond tomorrow if I have any thoughts. I'm posting now to bump your thread.

It's great that you are doing your homework in advance. There's a lot to get in place, and planning it all out is the right way to do it.

Welcome to the forum!
 
Thanks! I showed my wife your parsons pics today and she's about as jealous as I am. Looking forward to your response.
 
I don't think you should recycle the water. One bucket for waste and one bucket with new misting water. Imo!

Don't know about panthers but my veiled and jacksons would be chowing down on the baby tears. The plants wouldn't grow fast enough.

I like your idea about the natural bottom. I would stay away from worms and by iso's and spring tails from a breeder so there is less chance of sickness and parasites.

Ben
 
Do NOT recycle your water from the drain-off bucket, back into the cage. Always use fresh, clean water. You may have substrate and earthworms cleaning your water, but do you really know how good of a job they are doing? Bacteria will still get through, and even though bacteria may not clog your lines, it's going to end up very bad for you in the long run. You don't want any kind of contamination being sprayed back into your cage.
 
I agree about not recycling the water. We almost mimicked the Dragon strand set up with the great stuff. Turned out awesome! To us at least. If I can give advice/ if you want some, take your time with the great stuff and draw out your set up. It can be a mess!! Good luck, show pics!!
 
Ok, definitely won't be recycling my water. Didn't even think about the parasite issue with worms, but it's definitely a good one, so thanks.
 
You really can't go wrong with the Dragon Strand cage. They've been designed specifically with chameleons in mind, so it's very different than sticking a chameleon in an aquarium. With screen door and top, you'll still get plenty of air flow for your panther.

As far as emptying frequency goes, it all depends on how much water you run through your system and the bucket you use to catch it. I have a five gallon painter's bucket for my reservoir, and another for my run off and I only empty every week or so, and the bucket is never full. I have my misting system set to go off for five minutes at 10am, another five minutes at 1pm, and then for a minute at 4pm, with a twenty minute shower on Fridays, so there's a good bit cycling through.
 
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