Force fed him for first time today - felt a tad bad for him

[trickedoutbiker]

So I have a panther chameleon which has been in my possession since October of 2015. He was 3 months old when I first got him, meaning he was born sometime in July. To keep it simple, I just say his birthday is July 1st. So now, he is about 1 year and 8 months old.

The entire time I have had him, there has never been any problems. He had a spot on him one time and I thought it was a burn but it was some odd patch of skin that never came off when he shed (but it did end up coming off the following shed). That's literally the only problem I have ever had with the little man. He gets his food dusted per the recommended schedule we all talk about here and he gets lots of sunlight during the summer. He has never had any parasites and gets checked two times a year for them. He has always been active and has always ate every insect presented to him. I go out with a net in the summer and catch all sorts of wild bugs for him and he loves the variety, the katydids especially. Sometimes it would take him an hour or so to actually want to eat a new bug if it was his first time seeing it, but he always has, without question. Never has been picky. Well, that is, until lately.

You see, my chameleon is hooked on Superworms. Like, bad. "Bad" is actually an understatement. Don't ask me how, because it is something I've only ever gave him a few times a week as treats for the entire course of his life.

He used to eat crickets all the time as his main feeder until I got tired of the noise and the die-offs and moved him to Dubia in April 2016, which was a process, but he did it successfully. He has always eaten them since then without question. Well, up until the past couple months.

All the little man wants is Superworms now and I have ZERO idea why. He has turned down EVERYTHING I have bought for him lately except for Blue Bottle Flies, which aren't the greatest feeders because they cannot be gutloaded. Literally, every other thing, he just stares at unless it is a superworm, which he strikes at within seconds, every time, without hesitation. When I've been feeding him all the time, I always give a few different insects per feeding to avoid him getting bored with something as they sometimes do if they eat the same thing too much. I always try to keep things switched up the best I can.

In the past two months, I've bought him hornworms, crickets, black soldier fly larvae (which I would let turn into flies), and silkworms. He wastes it all and doesn't even touch it, which is quite irritating, because if I wanted to waste money, I would throw it in a fire. Superworms are all he wants right now and I have no idea what gave him that silly idea. Yea, superworms are okay to eat, but they are definitely not good as a main staple feeder. Kyú seems to think otherwise....

So today, I finally broke, and I did what I had hoped I would never have to do. I force fed him a single medium-sized Dubia roach. It was honestly a bit painful for me to do because I could tell he was not happy at all about it. I got him out of his cage and sat down at the kitchen table, and was going to do the method of grabbing behind his jawbone to make him open his mouth, but our Mini Aussie dog decided it wanted to run up to me at this point. I should of stayed in the room the chameleon is in to avoid the dog like usual, but quite honestly, the dog helped. Once Kyú saw that dog at my feet, he puffed up brighter than I have ever seen him get, and he also started to hiss too, which is something I have never heard him do in my life.

He is typically a very calm chameleon. When he puffed up and opened his mouth, I put the medium-sized Dubia in his mouth using a pair of tweezers to avoid getting bitten. He spit it out the first time, so I tried it a second time, with success. As soon as it was in his mouth the second time, I immediately lifted him into the air as far as I could above me so he would be above everything and out of view of the dog. He shut his mouth and swallowed the Dubia. Success. I then proceeded to place him back in his cage, and I won't bother him or even look at him until tomorrow so he can have a chance to calm down.

It's not something I wanted to do. At all. I feel like he is going to hate me forever now and ruin all of the progress we have made with him over the course of his time with us. He's always been so friendly and comes out of his cage if you place your finger next to him, because in the summer, that usually means he is getting to go outside for a couple hours. He loves the outside trees he chills in. I feel like he is going to hate my guts until eternity now....

To be honest, I have no idea what I am looking for with this post. I just needed to vent a bit because like I mentioned, it's not something I ever thought I would have to do for the lil man. But it needed to be done. He needs to kick this superworm crap he is on. All he has ate in the past month and a half are superworms and nothing more, besides all 100 blue bottle flies I got from Nick Barta when I bought a cleaner crew for my roach colony (thanks by the way Nick if you are reading this). And even then, Kyú is hardly eating the superworms because I am not giving him a lot of them due to the fact that they are hard-shelled and not the best main feeders as I mentioned before. He is on an every-other-day feed schedule, and for the past month or so, he has been eating the superworms every other day, about 3 of them a day. Not enough to fill him up, but enough to where he is not completely starving. Any other insect I have bought and tried to give him, he just looks at me like I am stupid. So I tried to starve him this past week for 5 days and see if that might make him more willing to eat something other than a worm since there was nothing in his belly. He didn't want to budge. That's when I decided to force feed him today.

I don't know why he was eating Dubia perfectly fine as his main feeder for almost a year and decided he didn't want them no more. It's not like he was getting sick of them because like I mentioned before, I have always offered him 2-3 different feeders per feeding to keep him interested. It's always been about 3-4 medium sized Dubia, plus two other insects at least, giving him only one of them each per feeding. Never had a problem with that. In the summer, he actually hardly eats Dubia because I am so busy catching him butterflies, dragonflies, katydids, cicada, praying mantids, moths, walking sticks, and a few other things.

So what gives? Does anyone AT ALL have ANY tips for how to get him off this superworm kick he is on? Like I said, I don't know what made him start this, but I do know that superworms aren't about to be his main feeder. That's what my colony of Dubia is for. He needs to eat the Dubia and everything else I present as well. It's getting to be quite irritating.

Any tips at all or any input would be appreciated more than you could ever know.

 

[Camillesmum]

I can't offer any advice but wanted to offer some sympathy. I hope that someone can offer you some solutions & help you out of the superworm stand off

 

[jannb]

A variety is best but some only like one thing. My boy Hendershot only ate supper worms when he came to me. I kept offering him other foods but superworms was all he wanted. He ate nothing but supers the first two years I had him and then one day he finally decided to try a horn. Then a few months later he tried silks and then butterworms but worms are all he ever wanted. He lived to be over 6 years old. Most of the chameleons I've had did not like any kind or roaches.

 

[Andee]

Were you weighing him while you were waiting him out? I would do that if you are trying to make them hungry enough to eat something else. Unless he starts losing weight drastically, I honestly would not be worried about waiting longer than 2 weeks. As long as he shows no other signs of sickness and it doesn't really sound like he does. It just sounds like he knows you will break sooner than he does.

 

[AZChamFan]

I totally agree with what the others have said, but if you do feel the need to continue force feeding there's another option which has worked very well for me in the past and it causes zero stress to the animal. Have you tried feeding him a superworm and then when he's just finishing up the superworm but still opening and closing his mouth stick a roach part way in? Often they will grab the additional food item and eat it with no problems and not even really realize what happened! One advantage you have this way is he's already in eating mode! Don't put any supplements on this item and you don't want to give him any reason to spit it out - supplement the item that he wants to eat instead. It may also be helpful to kill or partially kill the roach so it doesn't struggle too much and this will also make it easier for you to handle and get into his mouth. You may also need to hold the roach with forceps unless he has no fear of your hand and fingers. Anyways it's just another thought!! Recently my newly imported Verrucosus needed meds for parasites and lost a lot of his appetite for a while. He would only eat hornworms during this time. I used this method to continue getting roaches into him while he was being picky.

 

[kinyonga]

Force feeding should be a last resort IMHO. It's something you do when your chameleon has an illness. It shouldn't be necessary when he's just not eating cause he's hooked on superworms/one insect.
Have you tried not feeding him for a couple of days and leaving some crickets in his cage?
You can try slipping a cricket between his teeth when his mouth is opening and shutting as he drinks.

 

[trickedoutbiker]

He ate nothing but supers the first two years I had him and then one day he finally decided to try a horn.

Holy cow, TWO YEARS!!!! That's a long time. Wouldn't the same bug for two years straight be really bad for them? That's like, no variety at all. But if he lived to be over 6 years old, then he couldn't of been TOO bad off...

Were you weighing him while you were waiting him out?

I have a pair of scales actually but wasn't weighing him during this time. Didn't even dawn on me. I didn't want to stress him by putting him into the dish on my scales and make him ticked off and not want to eat.

Unless he starts losing weight drastically, I honestly would not be worried about waiting longer than 2 weeks. As long as he shows no other signs of sickness and it doesn't really sound like he does. It just sounds like he knows you will break sooner than he does.

He doesn't show any signs of sickness or anything. He is as healthy as a horse. He DEFINITELY knows I will break sooner or later. After all, I definitely don't want him to starve to death. I'd rather give him Supers than watch him die. I've never starved him for two weeks. A week tops is my limit. Then I break. And I think he knows that.... lol.

Have you tried feeding him a superworm and then when he's just finishing up the superworm but still opening and closing his mouth stick a roach part way in? Often they will grab the additional food item and eat it with no problems and not even really realize what happened!

I have tried that yes. If I stick my fingers or tweezers near him while he is eating anything, he puffs up a bit and stops chewing. Good idea, but I tried it and it was a no-go.

It may also be helpful to kill or partially kill the roach so it doesn't struggle too much and this will also make it easier for you to handle and get into his mouth.

Today when I force-fed, I actually did partially kill the roach to make it easier. I squeezed it pretty good with the tweezers so it wasn't moving all around while trying to get it into his mouth.

Have you tried not feeding him for a couple of days and leaving some crickets in his cage?

Read my original post. Yes, I have. I have starved him for almost a week to make him hungry and he still wouldn't take anything other than superworms. Not even crickets. I've tried those a couple times these past 2 months.

Force feeding should be a last resort IMHO. It's something you do when your chameleon has an illness. It shouldn't be necessary when he's just not eating cause he's hooked on superworms/one insect.

You can try slipping a cricket between his teeth when his mouth is opening and shutting as he drinks.

It's definitely not something I wanted to do my friend. I felt quite bad about it. Roaches are so much more healthier than superworms though as far as makeup goes, and they are also way easier to gutload. As for slipping a cricket in when he is drinking.... that idea is a no-go as well. He won't ever drink when I have the cage open. If I look at him while he is drinking, he will stare at me but keep drinking. The second I open the cage up though, he will stop. He doesn't like to be bugged when he is drinking.





I am going to try to feed him normally tomorrow and see what happens. Heck, if I could get him to eat ANYTHING besides JUST superworms, I would be happy. Doesn't even have to be Dubia. It can be anything in the world. I just don't want him eating one thing and one thing only. Variety is key to a healthy animal. Jann seems to have a chameleon that did alright on superworms for 2 years but I really hope it doesn't come to that. If so then so be it I guess. At least he will still be alive and happy. Thanks for input everyone. I love this community.

 

[carol5208]

You can gutload superworms the same as crickets as roaches. They eat EVERYTHING. Not sure what you meant, that they are not as easy to gutload as roaches. They really are!

 

[kinyonga]

I can't see where you said he ate nothing at all for two weeks....I read that you were still giving him superworms.
Hopefully he will eat normally for you tomorrow. Good luck!

 

[trickedoutbiker]

You can gutload superworms the same as crickets as roaches. They eat EVERYTHING. Not sure what you meant, that they are not as easy to gutload as roaches. They really are!

I meant like, a Dubia roach can have a super fat gut, full of nutrients because they have bigger bellies than a Superworm. All of my roaches eat really well. Their bellies are always plump and full of goodies. When you hold one, it almost feels as if they will explode because they are so fat.

Surely, Superworms eat everything that a roach or a cricket will, but their bellies are considerably smaller than a roach or cricket belly, meaning that you would have to feed more Superworms to get the same effect as feeding crickets or Dubia. Like, in order to get the same amount of gutload material into your chameleon that you would from a roach or a cricket, you'd have to feed 2x as many Superworms as if you were only feeding crickets or Dubia because the Superworms have a smaller belly. Does that make sense? I guess I should have explained it a little better. Sorry.

Good news though. The stubborn lil bugger ate a roach today. Didn't have to beg him to or force him to. He did it on his own free will after watching it roam his cage for about 20 minutes or so. He also ate 4 Superworms today too. I only gave him the Superworms after proudly watching him devour the roach. I guess he finally got hungry enough. He wouldn't eat more than one though because I had 3 of them roaming his cage and he ignored the other two. But for making daddy proud, I gave him his prized Superworms. Quite ironic that I made this thread just yesterday and he just decided to budge today. Guess I should have waited one more day to make the thread huh? lol.

 

[jannb]

How often do you normally feed him? I recommend every other day. My well filled out adult veileds and panthers I only feed three times a week.

 

[Chameleon Crazy Chick]

At what age should you start feeding them less food? mine is 7/8 months and eats like a horse, and I'm breeding superworms behind my mothers back... I'm worried that by the time I get a good colony up and growing he won't be able to eat them all.

 

[trickedoutbiker]

How often do you normally feed him?

Every 2-3 days.