Excessive hiding

[andy27012]

I have a 11 month old f1 female panther, I tend to leave her alone as she is not friendly and has a tendency to go on eating strikes if handled or stressed. I have her in a standard 24x24x48 screen cage. I had a pothos that was wrapped around a post, it is about three feet tall. When I took her out for company I noticed she was quite skinny and a little dehydrated, I removed the pothos and put in some fake plants essentially forcing her to stay up top near the mister and near the heat lamp where the crickets hang out, she has been drinking and pounding the crickets since removing the pothos. My theory is that she was hiding in the pothos all the time and not able to see food or water as it was VERY dense. Has anyone else had experience with their chameleon doing this?

 

[jastate09]

Do you have a dripper for her? My female panthers always drank from the dripper.

 

[Carlton]

I have a 11 month old f1 female panther, I tend to leave her alone as she is not friendly and has a tendency to go on eating strikes if handled or stressed. I have her in a standard 24x24x48 screen cage. I had a pothos that was wrapped around a post, it is about three feet tall. When I took her out for company I noticed she was quite skinny and a little dehydrated, I removed the pothos and put in some fake plants essentially forcing her to stay up top near the mister and near the heat lamp where the crickets hang out, she has been drinking and pounding the crickets since removing the pothos. My theory is that she was hiding in the pothos all the time and not able to see food or water as it was VERY dense. Has anyone else had experience with their chameleon doing this?

It can certainly happen. Some chams are fussy about how they prefer to get their water. It could also be that wherever she happened to feel safest was not the most convenient place to drink her fill. It could also be that your cage setup is drying out faster than you realize and she was dehydrating faster than she could drink. How do you measure humdity in the cage? A dehydrated cham eats less and less or won't eat at all.