Husbandry Double Check Before Vet Visit - Long post

KLowery88

Avid Member
I’m taking my rescue guy in for another vet visit on Friday and I want to double check that my husbandry is set so that I’m not contributing to any of the issues he’s been having. He’s the veiled I’ve mentioned in the below threads, but I’ll recap a bit here. This turned out to be a long post, so please bear with me.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/thr...-male-veiled-today-advice-appreciated.145566/

https://www.chameleonforums.com/threads/recurring-impacted-sperm-plugs.146971/

I took Monty in on December 8th 2015, so I’ve only had him two months. His previous owners were rather clueless about reptile care, and Monty previously belonged to their son who dumped him off on them. They took him to the vet over the course of the year they had him, and the vet has records going back to December of 2014, but they never really dedicated themselves to applying proper husbandry practices to his care. They also handled him roughly to the point of injury, so he has a great mistrust of hands and people.

He has several health issues, some healed, some ongoing.
  • At one point he suffered from MBD, especially seen on his left rear leg. He doesn’t have it now, just the damage from it.
  • Also at one point the end of his tail became black and limp, so it was amputated. That has healed nicely.
  • His left turret is more sunken than the right, which looks normal. Also the left pupil seems permanently constricted, and he seems to be completely blind in that eye.
  • His teeth are very brown and dirty looking, but there is no redness or swelling around them that I have seen so far. My vet has been keeping an eye on it, and there is no redness or inflammation, so I’m not sure if this is any cause for concern.
And the greatest issue that I am dealing with right now:

When I got him, he had a large impaction of sperm plugs that were cleaned out by the vet on December 14. After those were removed he had more energy and I believed he was eating well for a few weeks, but on January 15th when I was breaking down his old cage after setting up his new one, I found many bugs hiding in the pothos I had at the bottom of the cage that I thought he had been eating. After moving him into the new cage I built a more secure milk jug feeder and kept a closer eye on the amount he was eating. He was off food for his first week in the new cage, which I know can sometimes happen when moving an animal into a new environment, but I worried since I found so many insects that he had not been eating for longer and made a vet appointment. I saw him straining to pass something on January 21, I figured it might be the sperm plugs again, and at his vet appointment the next day, they cleared out another impaction. A few days after that vet visit on January 26, he was eating on his own again.

Now he has been off food for about a week, and I believe it is the same issue of impacted sperm plugs. I eased out two on Monday, but they weren’t outrageously impacted. Right after I did that and had returned him to his cage, he passed a small bit of fecal matter and a small urate, so I was able to get the fecal sample to a vet. The only thing they saw when doing the fecal test was pinworms.

His weight fluctuates with the sperm plug impacting:

02/09/16 – 124g (Taken by me)
01/30/16 - 131g (Taken by me)
01/22/16 - 120g (Latest vet visit)
01/19/16 - 122g (Taken by me)
01/09/16 - 125g (Taken by me)
12/07/15 - 118g (Last vet check with his previous owners. I took ownership of him on 12/8/15)
07/15/15 - 96g (from vet records)
01/09/15 - 29g (from vet records)
12/26/14 - 25g (from vet records)

I’m sorry this has been so long of a post, but I didn’t want to leave anything out that might be relevant. His current set up and supplementation set up is below:

Chameleon Info:
  • Your Chameleon - Veiled male, been in care month and a half, likely around a year to year and a half but not sure of age
  • Handling - As little as possible. Just to weigh or remove from cage for vet visits. Three times taken outside to get some natural sunlight
  • Feeding - Offering discoid roach nymphs and superworms in feeder cups, crickets free range. Occasionally hornworms. Tried BSFL and waxworms to tempt into eating.
  • Supplements - Repashy Supercal NoD during the week, Repashy Calcium Plus on first and third Saturday of the month. Additionally supplementing with vit A from a gel capsule once a week.
  • Watering – Mistking system with rain nozzle. Two minutes at 10am, one minute at noon, one minute at 4pm. Five minute shower on Fridays at 1pm, thinking of doubling this to 10 minutes, and bumping up all the other misting times.
  • Fecal Description – Last poop was on February 8th, small and hard, after not having gone for a while. Small urate was white.
Cage Info:
  • Cage Type - Screen, 24x24x48"
  • Lighting - Reptisun 10.0 tube, on at 8:30am, off at 9pm.
  • Temperature - Basking: 93 to 95, Ambient: 77 to 80
  • Humidity - Around 50% ambient, 60-70% within plant leaves,
  • Plants - Pothos at top, Schefflera in the middle
  • Placement - Home office room
  • Location - North Florida
20160207_131251.jpg

The previous suggestions for the recurring impactions were dehydration and lack of vit A, so I’ve been doing my best to address both of those. I worry about over supplementing with vit A, so perhaps I’ve been too cautious about it. Attached is an article detailing some issues that arise with lack of vit A, and he’s suffered from more than just the sperm plug impactions on the list.

This is a long post, and I hope it’s just me over-worrying and that he’s simply taking longer to recover than I would like, but I like to get as many opinions as possible to make sure I’m not doing anything wrong, or if there is something extra that might help, please suggest it. It's hard not having normal behavior and health to compare to.

I’m concerned about all the stress the environment changes and frequent vet visits have been putting him under, so after this visit on Friday, I’m thinking about giving him a month of minimal handling and interaction, no vet visits unless it's an emergency, no changing of cage, and see how he does. Is this a good idea? Would it make any difference? He is not a social chameleon at all, and from what I could infer from the brief meeting with his previous owner, he was either ignored or handled roughly by being pulled off branches. Humans to him are definitely stressors.

Again, sorry for the super long post, and thank you for reading if you’ve made it this far.
 

Attachments

  • Chameleons and vitamin A.pdf
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Monty had his vet visit today and my vet decided to give him a vit A shot to see if it helps him with his sperm plug issues. He's holding steady at 125g, but I'm hoping his appetite will improve and he'll pack on a bit more weight.
 
Poor little guy. I have no advice other than best of luck to you both. Hopefully you can figure out his underlying issues and get him back on a healthy road.
 
Poor little guy. I have no advice other than best of luck to you both. Hopefully you can figure out his underlying issues and get him back on a healthy road.

The luck is much appreciated! I'm betting heavily on the vit A helping, so I hope it pays off. If not, I guess we're back to square one. He's still active and fiesty, moving around well and drinking, so I hope I'm just over worrying.
 
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