Getting Food Ready For Hatchlings

[jajeanpierre]

If all goes well, I'll have 12 quad eggs hatch in about two to three months.

What food do I need and how much?

Can anyone give me some guidelines on how they prepare (food) for a clutch? I definitely don't want to be in a position where I end up low on feeders or worse, completely out of food.

These are my first every eggs. Thanks.

 

[DeremensisBlue]

Janet,
This is the perfect time to start fruit fly colonies. I would create four containers of hydei a week. It will be overkill for a clutch of quads, but the last thing you want is to run out of food at this point in their lives. You will just have to maintain a cup making schedule until the babies are born. Once they are born you can stop as you will have more than enough food to get them to the two week cricket stage. Quads may grow slow, but they hatch big.

As I said, this schedule will have more fruit flies then they can hope to eat, but it covers accidents and unforeseen events. The most stressful thing in chameleon keeping is having babies hatch and no food small enough available.

Depending on how big they hatch out at they may graduate to two week crickets pretty quickly. But you will be set for how ever long or short that may be.

Bill

 

[jajeanpierre]

Janet,
This is the perfect time to start fruit fly colonies. I would create four containers of hydei a week. It will be overkill for a clutch of quads, but the last thing you want is to run out of food at this point in their lives. You will just have to maintain a cup making schedule until the babies are born. Once they are born you can stop as you will have more than enough food to get them to the two week cricket stage. Quads may grow slow, but they hatch big.

As I said, this schedule will have more fruit flies then they can hope to eat, but it covers accidents and unforeseen events. The most stressful thing in chameleon keeping is having babies hatch and no food small enough available.

Depending on how big they hatch out at they may graduate to two week crickets pretty quickly. But you will be set for how ever long or short that may be.

Bill

Thanks Bill.

What do you mean by "four containers a week"? I have absolutely no concept of how much these guys will eat, and you're right, my worst nightmare is to run out of food.

Should I order some pinhead crickets near to when the eggs might hatch? Or wait until they hatch?

Thanks!

 

[DeremensisBlue]

Janet,
By "cups" I mean fruit fly cultures. You buy a cup of hydei fruit flies and separate them into four other cups with fruit fly media in them and then let them sit until they explode with the next generation. By doing this once a week you will end up with more fruit flies than a clutch or two could ever eat! It takes a number of weeks for the fruit flies to mate, lay eggs, and hatch out so you have to do this ahead of time. The length of time depends on the temperature. The high 70s will give you fruit flies in three to four weeks.
The real reason to start more than four weeks before you need them is to practice and get it down. The actual recipe and steps are the easy part and it is pretty hard to mess up, but the discipline takes practice for some people. And I remember finding the most ridiculous ways to screw up the recipe. I needed the practice!

It is frustrating having fly cultures explode and die out before the eggs hatch, but there is no way around this because you don't know when the eggs will actually hatch. And once they hatch you don't have time to start cultures and wait until they produce.

Order crickets only after the babies hatch. Crickets get shipped pretty quickly so you should be fine. But it gets expensive buying and shipping crickets. An active fruit fly culturing will produce much more food cheaper and more reliably.
Bill

 

[ponders]

Here is what I have been using with great success:

 

[jajeanpierre]

Janet,
By "cups" I mean fruit fly cultures. You buy a cup of hydei fruit flies and separate them into four other cups with fruit fly media in them and then let them sit until they explode with the next generation. By doing this once a week you will end up with more fruit flies than a clutch or two could ever eat! It takes a number of weeks for the fruit flies to mate, lay eggs, and hatch out so you have to do this ahead of time. The length of time depends on the temperature. The high 70s will give you fruit flies in three to four weeks.
The real reason to start more than four weeks before you need them is to practice and get it down. The actual recipe and steps are the easy part and it is pretty hard to mess up, but the discipline takes practice for some people. And I remember finding the most ridiculous ways to screw up the recipe. I needed the practice!

It is frustrating having fly cultures explode and die out before the eggs hatch, but there is no way around this because you don't know when the eggs will actually hatch. And once they hatch you don't have time to start cultures and wait until they produce.

Order crickets only after the babies hatch. Crickets get shipped pretty quickly so you should be fine. But it gets expensive buying and shipping crickets. An active fruit fly culturing will produce much more food cheaper and more reliably.
Bill

Thanks, Bill.

Nick Barta took pity on me and called me to give me his advice, too. Thank you both for all the help you've given me.

So, just to be clear, I want four cups "full" of fruit flies at all times? Is four enough?

I have a couple of cups teeming with bean bugs and realized that if I got desperate, a small hand-held vacuum in my compost bin might do in a pinch. They would b e flighted fruit flies, but edible nonetheless.

Have you ever had your montane babies react to commercial pinhead crickets?

I found the wc quads sometimes reacted to certain shipments of crickets by getting edema, even when I fed the crickets for days with good gutload (cricket crack) and fresh food. It seemed really obvious that is was the crickets when they all blew up with edema at the same time and the only difference was the new crickets. Is that a problem with the babies? (I switched to a different supplier and the edemas have all finally resolved with the exception of one.)

What else should I be getting ready now? (Quads are due to hatch in two to three months.)

 

[jajeanpierre]

Here is what I have been using with great success:

Thank you Tylene. How much do I need? I have twelve eggs now (fingers and toes crossed I get even one baby!) and the female looks as though she will be laying eggs "soon." She weighs 11g more right now than she did when she laid her clutch of 14 in March and she doesn't look like she will lay for a few weeks.

 

[junglefries]

Here is what I have been using with great success:

Most needed requirement for breeding, next to a male and female.

 

[jajeanpierre]

Okay, I'm just starting to order my fruit flies and supplies. I've ordered Repashy Superfly to feed them.

How big cups do I need? Is 12 enough?

Thanks