feeding strike

gollum

New Member
hi, i'm new to the forum, i have a male veiled chameleon thats gone on hunger stike, he used to eat eveything i put in from of him, then he would only eat waxworms, now only superworms, but he only eat a couple of them every few days!

he's about 18 months old, i heard they eat less when they get older,when is it normal for them to start eating less?

i've tried him with cockroaches, crickets, and locusts, he used to love locusts, but wont touch them now. he loves silkworms, but there hard to get in the uk, and i cant find anywhere that sells silkworm chow! i dust his food with chameleon dust every feed, and nurabol once a week, is this right?

he's in a 24"x24"x48" viv with mesh sides, a 10% uvb tube and a 100w basking lamp, i mist him 3 times a days and the humidity is between 30% and 80%(just after misting),he also has a drip system on about an hour a day, he has non toxic live plants and fake plants.

he seems really healthy, not dehydrated, no problem shedding his skin, doesnt sleep during the day, all seems fine, but im worried it wont last if he doesn't start eating a varried diet.

any help would be much appreciated, thanks
 
Dont let this bother you because it drove me crazy when my panther would only eat every few days and when he did it was 3 or 4 crickets if i was lucky. I took him off crickets for a month, didn't even let him see them and when i reintroduced them he chowed on them like crazy. Now i only feed him every other day to keep him from getting so picky. If you feed them every day, adult chams tend to sometimes be picky but if you wait a day, it seems like they're to hungry to really care lol. I always have a few types of feeders on hand. You should feed him every couple of days, and rotate insects every 3 times. For example, feed crickets on monday,wed,thurs, then feed locusts on saturday, monday, wed, and so on, changing feeders each time and then when you run about of a different feeder, start back at the beginning. My guy was very picky but now hes on a feeding schedual like this and its working out very well. Every cham is different so youll probably hit and miss but youll eventually figure him out. If hes visually healthy and not loosing any weight i wouldn't worry to much.
 
Howdy Wayne,

While you’re at it, keep track of his weight using a low-cost digital gram scale. This will give you an early warning if his weight begins to drop. A 10% drop might be a good time to start trying to turn things around unless he was overweight to begin with. As Nicodemayo mentioned, an adult will either slow down its food intake on its own or need to have it slowed down by the keeper. You may find that feeding just a couple of the larger food items (or equivalent) every other day will stabilize his weight and keep him interested in those food items too.
 
wild bugs?

thanks for the help guys, he's eating a bit more now, but still really picky, just wondered if anyone knows which wild cought bugs are most nutritional? i read somewhere that chams like slugs and snail, i tried mineon them and he loved then(especially the snails) but i dont wanna give him too many if there not a good feeder.

also, snails will eat cuttlefish bone as a source of calcium, would this make them particularly good feeder bugs? what about earth worms? obviously i get would get these bugs from areas without pesticides or aby other cemicals, sorry to ask soo many questions in one go, i just wanna know all i can! lol
 
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