First clutch

[Ladythrasher89]

• Your Chameleon - 7-9 month old female veiled. I have had her almost 2 months.
• Handling - Haven't been able to touch her since I got her really. she lets me pet her tail and back but not much else.
• Feeding - she get 3-4 super worms every other day and 8-12 medium crickets daily. All dusted with calcium except Monday Thursday is calcium with vitamin d and Sunday she get herptavite also. The crickets are gut loaded with a cricket block, some cricket drink cubes and kale.
• Supplements - brand of all supplements is rep-cal
• Watering - I use a "little dripper" drip system to water all day. She drinks right from the hose several times throughout the day for a few minutes off and on. I also mist when I am home every 2 hours for about a minute until everything in the cage is damp. I let it dry entirely between mistings. If I am out she doesn't get misted but her humidity hangs around 60 percent without misting.
• Fecal Description - dark brown/blackish poop and white urea. Formed pellet like poop. She poops daily.
• History- Nothing significant really she has been an easy chameleon. Only had her a short time. Got her a a local, small, pet store.

Cage Info:

• Cage Type- Zilla extra large 30x30x18 screen cage. Two natural plants, an umbrella plant, and a golden pothos. Dirt box in one corner for laying. He basking area is between 6 and 8 inches she has a couple levels to choose how close to get. It stays between 85 and 94 in the basking/uvb light and like 75-80 under the other lights in the cage. Top of cage temp is 90 bottom of cage temp is 70. She likes the hot spots best.
• Lighting - she gets 12 hours a day of light under a powersun bulb by zoo med in a deep dome fixture. she also has two small halogen heat lights since my cage is so wide. The halogens are Zilla brand in their brand fixtures.
• Temperature - cage stays between 95 in the basking area to 90 and 70 degrees from top to bottom in ambient temp. I have the basking light 8 inches from the lowest spot and another only 6 inches from the bulb. I measure from bottom of bulb to top of basking spot.
• Humidity - humidity hangs around 60-70 percent. I use live plants, misting and moist paper towels (from catching the drip run off of the little dripper) to keep it humid.
• Plants - I have 2 live plants. An umbrella and an pothos. Purchased from lowes and cleaned before repotting. Potted in organic soil mix and earthworm castings.
• Placement - my cage is located in my living room. It is in a slightly high traffic area. She isn't directly under any vent and the closest vent is more than 6 feet away. The top of the cage is about 5.5 feet off the floor.
• Location - We live in Austin Texas.

Current Problem: I noticed some rapid weight gain in my female. I also have noticed that my girl has been super cranky, hissing and turning super dark just from walking by her cage, which is unusual for her normally relaxed nature. I decided to take her to the vet for a check up. While attempting to pick her up she leapt from her vines and took a dive from about 30" high to the bottoms of her cage. At the vet they took X-rays and she has eggs developing, however, the eggs haven't calcified yet. I was told to increase her calcium levels as well as her vitamin d3 levels to help her eggs along to help get them out asap so to speak. The vet gave her an other wise clean bill of health, she didn't see any broken bones on the X-ray from the fall. Well between the fall and the vet visit she was mega stressed out. I covered her cage for the rest of saturday (that's when she went to the vet) through Sunday morning. She seems to be behaving oddly now though, she has been climbing on the walls, something I haven't seen since I brought her home, and climbing upside down on the ceiling. She is also displaying some dark patterning along her veil and sides. I am concered she is still super stressed out. I know stress and pregnancy are a bad combo, what can I do to help? Should I be concerned? Also yesterday I didn't see her drink water or leave one side of her cage, also super unusual since she is normally very active hunting her crickets down. Should I be concerned if this continues?

 

[bobcochran]

Gravid females tend to have some nervous energy when the time for egg deposition is getting close. The next step is for her to slow her eating and start hanging around the bottom of her enclosure. You didn't say if you have an egg laying bin in her cage, time to set one up!

 

[Ladythrasher89]

So you think this is just her getting ready to lay? How long does it usually take from the time they form eggs to the time she will actually lay? I do have an extra large plastic critter keeper in one corner of the cage. It is like 8-10 inches deep with some dirt I keep damp so it will hold a tunnel, do you think I need a larger one? She can stand in it without it being too short for her.

 

[bobcochran]

I don't know the width and length of your lay bin, besides it's up to her if she likes it or not! Some people use a five gallon bucket, those aren't very wide.
Egg laying usually occurs about 30 days after the receptive period ends, that would be when you noticed a color change. During receptivity she would be brightly colored, mostly greens, when it ends they usually turn dark but still have some yellow and blue dots.

 

[Ladythrasher89]

Ok so based on what you're saying I think she is in the receptive period now, she has had a major shift in color display with lots of darker green spotting and some blue streaking on her veil. She is also displaying a brighter yellow green all over too. She seems to be restless too. Her lay bin I made is maybe 8x10 and about 11 inches deep, full to about an inch from the top with substrate.

 

[bobcochran]

Well if she's just now in her receptive period, it would stand to reason that her eggs aren't calcified! Did the vet say anything about how big the eggs are?
There are a couple of vets who are members on this forum if you have the X-ray you could post them to get another opinion. Or you could ask your vet about the egg size.

 

[Ladythrasher89]

She said that in her opinion if in a month she hasn't laid to come back and that in like two weeks she would start looking for signs on going to the ground or hanging around low in the cage to signal she wants to lay. She didn't say exact size but said they were still a bit difficult to count/see the boundaries of one egg from the next, does that make sense? I think I have the time frame of when to expect eggs. I was just worried about stress levels now and what is considered an adequate lay box and whether I should be concerned about her behavior. I am a bit of a noob to reptiles and females. I just want to help her make it through this first clutch as safely as I can.