HOW do I do this and when?

[Eileen]

My female veiled chameleon Jade is around 8 months old according to what I was told when I bought her, and my question is, how do I go about cutting back on her feeders and when should I do that? She is gobbling 6-7 medium crickets every morning, and treats of bsfl, wax worm and small superworms every other day. She LOVES her food, and the first thing she does when her lights come on is crawl up to search her feeding dish for breakfast. She eats her crickets fast, sometimes not even completely swallowing one before grabbing the next. And her treats! She runs to my hand as soon as I hold it in the cage. I know that pretty soon, if not now, I should start feeding her half as much so she doesn't have too many eggs, but how do I do that? Do I go cold turkey and start skipping a day using the same amount of feeders? or less feeders each day? or what? I don't have any trouble with her basking temp.. she's good with it being 77-80, but I am so worried she's gonna hate me for skipping her breakfast

 

[MissSkittles]

Aww…hungry girl. I can’t tell you what others do, but I go the gradual route of cutting back. I would definitely start by reducing the number of feeders you give her, with the goal of getting her down to 3-4 daily. Then start on every other day, the same amount. If you want, you could wait until she starts to develop her colors and patterns before doing the final reduction to feeding 3 days a week.
For treats, I would be giving them less often and/or including them in the daily amount. I do both and with no rhyme or reason. Some days after putting their staple feeders in their feeding station, I then hand feed the ‘dessert worms’ (aka wax worms ) and just 1 per cham. Or maybe I count a superworm as a staple feeder. I do this only once a week or so, depending on the treat. One either Saturday or Sunday, this is really the designated treat day where they can count on getting a yummy snack. Since I have so many insectivores, I always have a good variety of feeders on hand. The only exceptions to regular treats are hornworms. I get them so infrequently and they grow so big, so fast, that whenever I get them, I give them whether it’s time for a treat or not.
Also, I felt really bad when I was giving just 3-4 feeders and my chams were looking for more food. I also feel bad when I’ve given larger feeders and they have to work a bit to eat it. So, I prefer to give smaller feeders and just give more of them. I know it’s just tricking myself, but it works so whatever. Do keep in mind that veileds are opportunistic eaters and will always look hungry and will keep eating until there’s food is gone.

 

[Eileen]

Aww…hungry girl. I can’t tell you what others do, but I go the gradual route of cutting back. I would definitely start by reducing the number of feeders you give her, with the goal of getting her down to 3-4 daily. Then start on every other day, the same amount. If you want, you could wait until she starts to develop her colors and patterns before doing the final reduction to feeding 3 days a week.
For treats, I would be giving them less often and/or including them in the daily amount. I do both and with no rhyme or reason. Some days after putting their staple feeders in their feeding station, I then hand feed the ‘dessert worms’ (aka wax worms ) and just 1 per cham. Or maybe I count a superworm as a staple feeder. I do this only once a week or so, depending on the treat. One either Saturday or Sunday, this is really the designated treat day where they can count on getting a yummy snack. Since I have so many insectivores, I always have a good variety of feeders on hand. The only exceptions to regular treats are hornworms. I get them so infrequently and they grow so big, so fast, that whenever I get them, I give them whether it’s time for a treat or not.
Also, I felt really bad when I was giving just 3-4 feeders and my chams were looking for more food. I also feel bad when I’ve given larger feeders and they have to work a bit to eat it. So, I prefer to give smaller feeders and just give more of them. I know it’s just tricking myself, but it works so whatever. Do keep in mind that veileds are opportunistic eaters and will always look hungry and will keep eating until there’s food is gone.

Thank you so much Miss Skittles. This is so helpful, and exactly the kind of details I was hoping for. I understand what you mean about more smaller feeders. I actually do this sometimes too.. this morning after her crickets, (there were only 5 because I thought I counted 7 in the bag but 2 were not moving so I took them out) I added 5 bsfls to the dish. She crawled down in there and got each one.. seemed like she was smiling when she found one.. like an easter egg hunt.
I am not noticing any actual colors on her. Will I be able to see if she is close to having eggs? Here she is just now.. still a tiny bit of skin from her last shed hanging on her tail.