fatal eye problem!

[annalol]

I have a 6-month old vieled chameleon, I have had him for three months.
I handle him about every other day.
I give him crickets and meal worms. Two or three mealworms a day and about 4 crickets. I usually feed him in the evening. I give the crickets the Orange Cube and dust them.
I dust the crickets with Reptivite reptile vitamins.
I use a spray bottle to mist him, I mist two or three times a day. I see him drink almost every time,
Recently his droppings have had a large amount of cob-web looking mold on them. He has never been tested for parasites.

Cage Info:
He is in a 20" x 10" glass cage.
I use a Zoo-Med uvb light and a 50 watt 6" heat lamp. I turn both lights on around 10am and turn them off around 10pm.
During the day the tempurature is from 80 on the floor to 85-90 in the basking area. The night temperature is about 65. I have a hydrometer and a thermometer inside the cage all the time.
The humidity stays betweem 40-60 during the day. I mist the whole cage two or three times a day. I use a hydrometer.
There are no live plants.
The cage is in the corner of my bedroom next to a window. The cage is about 4 feet from the floor.

The past month or two he has had eye problems. He keeps them closed almost all day, I rarely see them open and usually to get them open I have to tap on the glass or get his attention. I have taken him to the vet twice, once I got eye drops that didn't seem to help. We took him back and were given ointment that seems to be helping a little more. The eyes are not swollen so I don't think its an infection. Occasionally I see crusty stuff in the slits of his eyes and I carefully remove it. I was force feeding him fish food mixed with peanut butter and water with a siringe but it was starting to hurt him so now I've stopped and he hasn't eaten in 3 days and I can't do anything about it. Please help me!

 

[jannb]

You are cooking him at 90 in a glass cage.

 

[annalol]

If you read the whole thing, you would see that the entire cage is not at 90, only under the basking area and I don't even think its that much.

 

[jannb]

If you read the whole thing, you would see that the entire cage is not at 90, only under the basking area and I don't even think its that much.

As 6 months old the hotest basking spot should not be more than 84 or 85. I would rcommend a vet visit and then make changes to you husbandry. The eye problems could be caused by many different thing.

Not haveing the proper supplements, gutload and lighting. It's not good to feed in the evenings because they need hours under the lights before bed to digest their food. Mealworms are not good feeders for your cahm...they are hard to to digest. You need to gutload your feeders with fruits and veggies such as collard green, kale, buternut squash and bell pepper.

You also need live plants.

Is your UVB light the coil type or tube style? The coil has been know to cause eye problems.

You need the lightly dust with plain calcium with no D3 at just about every feeding. Calcium with d3 twice a month and a muli vit once a month.

Here's a great blog with tons of veiled info: http://raisingkittytheveiledchamele...-max=2008-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=11

 

[annalol]

perhaps you should go back and read my first post more thoroughly. I have visited the vet twice. I have changed the husbandry, I have moved the lights, and changed the soil.
Thank you for the information about the feeding and mealworms.
How should I go about feeding him fruits and veggies?

 

[annalol]

my uvb is a tube. what kind of live plants should I get and where can I buy them?

 

[jannb]

my uvb is a tube. what kind of live plants should I get and where can I buy them?

Are you in the US? If so Walmart, Home Depot or Lowes should have some nice plants. Pothos, hibiscus, ficus and schefflera are all very good.

I would try a different vet. One that's good with chameleons.

 

[annalol]

I went to a vet who was good with chameleons, he was a nice old man who specializes in lizards and I could tell he knew what he was doing. I'm not going to spend any more money at the vet, they've done all that they can. Thank you for the information about the plants, I'll try that.

 

[laurie]

Jann did not mean to feed your cham fruits & veggies but rather feed that to your crickets (I think). If your guy won't eat on his own feed him something natural for him. That would be a bug juice, mix mashed crickets, pedalite, ensure, and a drop of liquid calcium, if you have it. It is best to blend this mess them strain it and feed with a needle-less syringe.

Is there a reason he is not in a screen cage? Repteraiums are inexpensive at LLL reptile.

 

[annalol]

no I've been told you should feed the chameleon itself fruits and veggies. I was using a siringe to force feed him but it injured him so I can't use a siringe anymore.
he is not in a screen cage because he was too young, but hes old enough now to be in one, I'm currently trying to find one.

 

[pssh]

You can feed the veggies to the chameleon, but you need to feed them to the feeders. Do your vitamins have a preformed or proformed source of vit A? You need to start dusting correctly, it could be the cause of his eye problems.

 

[Ocelot357]

no I've been told you should feed the chameleon itself fruits and veggies. I was using a siringe to force feed him but it injured him so I can't use a siringe anymore.
he is not in a screen cage because he was too young, but hes old enough now to be in one, I'm currently trying to find one.

You cant feed a cham veggies.......nor force feeding!, your making his problems worse!

 

[pssh]

You cant feed a cham veggies.......nor force feeding!, your making his problems worse!

You definitely can feed them veggies (if they want any.) I would try just putting bugs in his mouth if you haven't already. use a rubber spatula to separate his mouth slightly and put a freshly killed and gutloaded bug in. He might start to chew on them.

 

[Daguerreotype13]

no I've been told you should feed the chameleon itself fruits and veggies. I was using a siringe to force feed him but it injured him so I can't use a siringe anymore.
he is not in a screen cage because he was too young, but hes old enough now to be in one, I'm currently trying to find one.

You shouldn't be force feeding the chameleon fruits and veggies through a seringe, thats not the proper approach. The idea of forcing the Cham to eat this way alone would explain how he was hurt.

You SHOULD however keep vegitables accessable to him, preferrably pinning greens to the branches of the plant he stays in so he can eat them right off, naturally as they would eat the leaves of a hibiscus or such plant.

As for fruits, you should ALWAYS gutload your feeders with vegitables and fruits are good as well, and let the vitamins and minerals transfer over into the Cham that way. This is the natural way to ensure your Cham's diet is healthy.

Powdering with calcium is also a necessity. Alternate between using regular calcium and then calcium containg D3. D3 is good for the Cham, however is bad if taken too much. I would suggest alternating between the two.

Personally, i use Rep-Cal Calcium, and then Stucky Tongue Farms Miner-All (contains D3) and alternate between the two.

 

[pssh]

That much d3 is generally not recommended daguerreotype, and especially if the chameleon recieves a lot of unfiltered sunlight. Most recommend using d3 only two or so times a month (especially with repcal as it is verrrry high in d3.)

 

[Daguerreotype13]

That much d3 is generally not recommended daguerreotype, and especially if the chameleon recieves a lot of unfiltered sunlight. Most recommend using d3 only two or so times a month (especially with repcal as it is verrrry high in d3.)

I've been using D3 once a week and things have been going fine, until he up and left me lol

 

[pssh]

Just because nothing has happened yet, it doesn't mean nothing will. I hope you find him.

 

[Daguerreotype13]

Just because nothing has happened yet, it doesn't mean nothing will. I hope you find him.

yea thanks, and thank you for all you've been doing to help, i really do appreciate it ... lemme know if you ever need anything, anything at all, and i'll be more than happy to help!

 

[annalol]

you're an idiot. you can in fact feed a chameleon fruits and vegetables. and force feeding him has absolutely nothing to do with his eye problem. don't bother responding if you have no idea what you're talking about.

 

[annalol]

You cant feed a cham veggies.......nor force feeding!, your making his problems worse!

you're an idiot. you can in fact feed a chameleon fruits and vegetables. and force feeding him has absolutely nothing to do with his eye problem. don't bother responding if you have no idea what you're talking about.