How much and often to feed/water baby Veiled Cham

[Lunirra]

I got her yesterday. Seems to be in good health, but she is my first Cham ever. She was the largest and most rambunctious of the 3 babies that were available. I believe i was told she is only 2-3 months old. Only about 2" long. She ate this morning, about 7 small crickets, later on i picked up some small meal worms and she had about 4 of those. Her food is being dusted and gut loaded. How would i go about feeding her greens too? I dont know how to start doing that? just put it in a bowl and she'll go eat em on her own? noob question i know lol. This is my first cham... ive had/have many other reptiles tho Also... i made a diy drip system and ive been spraying her cage in the morning and at night... only water ive seen her drink is a single droplet from a leaf since i got her. how often do they need to physically drink? do they get most of their water from their food? She has pooped for me once already too this morning. even a good link to a previous post about cham feeding/watering would be helpful too. thanks guys!!!

 

[greenflagreptiles]

Lunirra, congrats on your new arrival. What species of chameleon is she (for ex. Panther, veiled, ect...), as different species have different requirements. Panthers for example almost eat insects, worms and snailexclusivly, where as Veiled like some greens and a tad bit of fruit in addition to insects and worms. Most important is providing a variety of food sources and to properly gut load the feeders and dust on an appropriate schedule (I dust my panther cham juveniles feeders with calcium WITHOUT d3 everyday, twice a MONTH I dust with calcium W/D3 [1st AND 3rd Sat. of the month] and on the 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month I dust with a complete multivitamin/mineral supplement. For my adult Panthers, I follow same general guidelines, but the calcium W/D3 and multivit/mineral being given only once a month each, on 1st and 3rd Saturday, respectivly.

Sounds like your cham is eatting well, so now add variety....dubai roaches (discoid if you live in Florida where dubias are illegal to receive or posses), silkworms, hornworms, superworms, mealworms, butters worms, Phoenix worms, and there are many more available.

As for drinking, if she's not drinking enough mist more frequently ( 3-4 times a day, but make sure the cage denies completely in between mistings) and make sure your dropper drips onto a leaf/leaves and/or a vine. Make sure to treat your water for misting/dripper with reptile water treatment to get rid of chlorine and heavy metals. I strongly suggest using steam distilled or reverse osmosis ( R/O) bottled water (tapwater, and spring and drinking bottled water are full of heavy metals, pesticides, and flouride which causes cancer in animals) and Still treating it with a water treatment product like ReptiSafe, which also add electrolytes. If you'd like to guarantee water availability to you cham you can get a mister system. (A great investment esp. If you plan on getting a more chams). I have a Promise system for my 8 panthers. I've set it to go on 4X a day, for 30 seconds at a time, this and hand misting helps keep the humidity at proper level. Adding a live plant helps keep humidity. My favorites are ficus benjamin, schefflera, umbrella plant, hybiscus, and pothos. Many more are available, check the files section of this site. Make sure throughly rinse of leaves of new plants to revoke fertilizers, and replace soil in pot with a organic, pesticide free soil. I then cover soil with large smooth riverrocks, marbles, or other smooth rock to prevent cham from investing soil when shooting insects mackon top of soil.

I hope someone with more experience chimes in and fills any other Q's you might have!

 

[laurie]

Hello and welcome, I hope you are your little veiled are getting alone well. Just give a few days to settle in, some chams take a good few days to get acclimated to a new home.

Here is lots of info's about veileds when you are bored watching your baby.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/care/caresheets/veiled/