My chameleon is very skittish too. At the beginning he used to dart to the other side of the cage when I walked in the room and it was very hard to get close to him. He still does get nervous when I'm around and hides behind his favorite branch as soon as I walk in the room, but he's been slowly getting better.
I'm not a very patient person.. I've never been. But if there's one thing chameleons teach you is LOTS of patience! Literally everything with them seems so slow to me lol. After reading lots of advice on this forum I decided to step back a little and let my little boy do his own thing, and despite the fact that progress has been VERY slow, it's still noticeable.
As suggested by our forum friends, here's what I did:
First of all, let him be! This was hard for me as I am a very hands on person... But it's been a very interesting experience to learn to respect my little boy and his personal space. I now understand that as much as he's "mine", he's his own little individual as well. Think about it, your little girl is probably terrified and feels like she's about to be eaten and die every time your hand tries to grab her!
Then, I started making sure that he sees my hand dropping food in his enclosure every time I feed him. That way he starts to associate me with food. Slowly, I started offering worms with tongs. I had to hold the damn thing in front of him sometimes for up to five minutes and he still wouldn't take it. In fact, for a very long time, he wouldn't even touch his food if there were people in sight.. even if they were very far away. Over and over I was left disappointed and with a very sore arm lol. But one day... boom! He took the first worm!
Some days its easier to hand feed him than others. It really depends on his mood. You just have to be very persistent and extremely patient. I'd give her a lot of space for a while since you guys have been trying so much to get her out of the cage. Let her adapt and take it a step at a time. For the first time ever, my boy WILLINGLY climbed on my hand the other day when he was outside enjoying the sunlight, and man I was so excited. It's taken months of hard work, consistency, patience, and a lot of respect. Like someone above mentioned, listen to your little girl and take it a step at a time! She might not end up begging you to pick her up every time you walk by, but little by little she could learn to tolerate human presence and interaction.
