I think my Chameleon is afraid of me...

[Hierophant]

Hey, new guy here.

I think my Yemen Chameleon is afraid of me, as it's got purple markings around it's head, and faint black stripes down it's side with white scales, although this stripes/scale thing only happens every now and again.

I did try at first to gently grab the Yemen [I call her, Chimaira] from above and force it out, which I later found out is by far the wrong thing to do.


How can I get Chimaira to "appreciate" me and know that it's living in a nice, loving home?


Thanks in regards, H.

 

[Eyal]

First thing, how big is you terrarium, any green plants to hide in? Much traffic infront of the terrarium?

You can hand feed your cham, making it reach when its on your hand. You can put your hand infront of your cham, and take the other hand to feed it and make the cham walk on your hand. If you grab it, youll need to start all over.

Chameleons are not for petting

 

[Hierophant]

How do I get a Cham to eat off of my hand if the food is always leaping off it?

But thanks for the quick reply. Here's a picture: http://s253.photobucket.com/albums/...current=BioHazardTopSecretRogueGallery001.jpg

Me and my Mom were just talking a few minutes ago about getting more leafs/branches and things for it to hide in. Hope it's not too stressed or anything.

http://s253.photobucket.com/albums/...ew&current=BioHazardTopSecretRogueGallery.jpg

 

[tryme]

Use waxworms to start with as they love them, they move quite a bit and don't jump.

 

[tryme]

and your setup is pretty much all wrong. I'll point you in the right direction and i'm sure some more experieced keepers will help you out.

Start off with Brad Ramseys great site:

http://raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.blogspot.com/

 

[jannb]

Is that a glass tank? Where do you live?

 

[skeeta]

Yeah, she's a beauty! If you want to keep her healthy and stress free (if she's happy, she will hate you less, and even climb on your hand once in a while)

Follow Tryme's suggestion and get your mom to read brad's blog with you.

Lots of work I'm afraid!

 

[Hierophant]

Is that a glass tank? Where do you live?

What the hell does that have to do with anything?

And yes, it's a glass tank. Thats what the shop keeper said would be best for it...

 

[Hierophant]

Yeah, she's a beauty! If you want to keep her healthy and stress free (if she's happy, she will hate you less, and even climb on your hand once in a while)

Follow Tryme's suggestion and get your mom to read brad's blog with you.

Lots of work I'm afraid!

Just because I'm still living with my mom doesn't mean I'm childish and can't handle anything. I've been doing all the work so far.

 

[skeeta]

Whoa, no offense intended! Often young people are on this forum and their parents are responsible for financial arrangements.

No one here is trying to insult you or your intelligence, but raising chams is not an easy proposition.

We have all meen mislead by shopkeepers intensions (I almost lost Skeeta before we found this forum)

Please read the blog mentioned and feel free to ask as many questions as you care to.

 

[tryme]

I didn't mean to cause offence either but you will soon find that when you learn more about chameleons, when you come across things like your situation with other people you will be slightly anoyed that an animal you care so much about isn't being cared for in the right way (weather it's your fault or not, I know we have all been mislead at some point.) Also, I believe it's a good idea to read through it with your mother as if you start asking her for money etc she may not understand why. That's all were trying to say, we thought it would cause you alot less hassle with your mom trying to explain everything. Lastly, chameleons are very time consuming and can be quite costly.

 

[tryme]

Your reply is actually quite rude. I'm sorry, I know you're young but you came to us asking for help so please don't reply with comments like that. It's insulting and rude. We only care for your chameleons health and wellbeing. I'm quite sick of kids buying animals they know nothing about. I know it's the shop keepers fault for selling it but still, people should think these things through.

 

[Revler]

Some Random Advice / Hope it helps

Often where you may live, i.e. country, city, or state may affect where the best places are for you to buy supplies. I don't think any one meant any offense by asking where you live it was just a question to get you pointed in the right direction. I have found that silkworms, if you can find them, are also a tasty feeder that wont escape from your hand too quickly when trying to hand feed OR, groan nobody call me out on this as cruel please!!!, you can remove the back jumping legs of the crickets if that's all you have access to locally. I attempt to stay away from the mealworms or superworms on younger chams as my vet told me too much chitan, the stuff that makes up their outer shell, can be difficult for some younger chams to digest in large quanteties so if you're at all unsure about your chams ability to take it down it's just better to stay away from it all together. So if silkworms, waxworms, or even Pheonix worms are unaccesable at this point -- (it is rare to find a pet store that carries silk or pheonix worms they are mostly online orders only but you might luck out with wax worms) -- then you could have to result to maiming your crickets for now to hand feed your cham.

As far as your cham being afraid of you she probably is right now. It's a completely natural reaction on their part. Their reptilian brain, as much as we love to say it can, can't really emotionally rationalize the fact that you care about her. However!!!! She can be taught through example to realize that you're not a threat AND even that you are an individual that supplies her with food and water (big positives in a pets brain ). If it is possiable and you don't have any cats or other hunting mamals in your house to contend with you might consider getting your cham out and putting on a house plant on ficus tree near you while you do every day activities like homework, paying bills, or surfing the net. Example: I keep a large ficus tree in my office so when I write letters and pay bills at night my dear Dr. Suess can get out and climb all over my office. Also, and this is a fun project, consider hanging some climbing rope or dried grape vine from your ceiling. I've draped some rope out of my office ficus. It goes up to the ceiling and is attached to in multiple places there and around the room. This gives your cham a really cool "jungle gym" effect for them to play on. Giving the opportunity to gain height around you, this will make your chameleon much more comfortable and less stressed, and, by giving them free reign to explore and walk around without feeling confined around you they will come to realize that you don't have a desire to "hunt them" and you don't see them (your chameleon) as prey.

If you do try this technique I would allow your cham to explore, under your watchful eye of course for an hour or two at a time without trying to interfere with her activities for the first few times. After you've let her out a couple of times and let her do her own thing on a "jungle gym" of your design or just a house plant try hand feeding her out of the cage. This will make coming to you more desireable. However, if she dosen't seem interested in the food avoid following her around with it and putting it in her face this could only stress her out. I was guilty of this early on, because I'm horriably impatient sometimes, and it never did any good. Just know she'll come around to eating out of your hand when she is ready and MOST chameleons can be taught to hand feed with time and patience.

I guess in conclusion to this LONG and WINDY post is the fact that I wish the best of luck to you. And, chameleons take time. I think whats great about this forem is that the people here REALLY want to help you. Learn from our mistakes. Most of us, myself included, have lost a cham to the evils of glass tanks because we just didn't know and "that's what the pet shop guy said". And, I'm sure you'll take everyones advice and get things fixed. But, all of us have fallen in love with these goofy little bug eyed buggers and while it is true they are not "petting pets." These wonderful lizards can make fantastic companions if given the right environment in which to grow.

Good luck and Keep us Posted.

 

[skeeta]

Well said Revler!