OldChamKeeper
Chameleon Enthusiast
I've been asked to post about my experience in dealing with imported chameleons over the years. Specifically the recent Quad import. I've been told apparently (who knows) that I have the only surviving female from the 1st import sent to the west coast. Honestly I'd rather stay in my cave after seeing some of the posts lately from 6 month experts on the forums. Nobody is listening and old mistakes are just being made.
Despite my personal feelings I'll give it a try, once.
In Dec I went in on the 1st large Quad import. Room being limited I only picked up one female. When I went out to see the animals sent to us on the west coast I got to see Bill's set up at his home (Dragon Strand). I was quite impressed. His set ups were top notch. He was well prepared for a bunch of imports. Despite that it clear to me at least one animal was at death's door. No amount of prep work can overcome a near death import.
I saw Bill had the short end of the stick as well as having is hands full. I asked which female was the best. He showed it to me. Then I surprised him by asking him for the second best since he needed the best one to off set the one at death's door in my opinion. The second best was really the second best upon inspection. She looked "ok" for an import and home we went.
So how did I know "she looked ok for an import"? That's the first part of learning how to work with imports and the first part of this lecture.
I had over the years of working in the pet industry the unpleasant experience of going directly to my reptile wholesalers and seeing first hand how many animals in a shipment would be in bad shape or "not suitable for sale". If anybody tells you as an importer all their animals are great upon arrival then something is very out of the norm. During these years of seeing multiple imported chameleons I didn't just walk in and buy a few for the pet stores I managed and just walk out. I would look at the animals, compare them, get some hands on experience with some of the visual cues for the differences between stressed animals and really sick ones. How can a person do that??? Well the only practical way and it's not 100% is to simply make sure the animal is alone and not within sight of other chameleons. After about 15 mins alone most chams will relax enough and show you their non stressed colors. Most species have a color/pattern that will tell you they are not feeling well. After I could see that then I'd select animals that had decent body weight and eyes that were not sunken while also looking for serious issues in the limbs, mouth, tail and toes.
Again, nothing is perfect with an import but these are things things I do when looking at chams and did while at Bill's house. He had one goner for sure and none of the females were a sure thing. His males were in better shape at a glance. All that said, I took my chances and took the second best female home.
At home, I do things contrary to what many other keepers do. Hence keeping to myself since I don't need any aggravation from other people.
1st - no huge cages. I have a nice 18"x18"x18" cube cage set up with plastic plants. Easy to clean. Plenty of cover. Imports need a huge amount of cover so they can relax. It's not on display and I only need to check on it once a day anyway, might as well just let it relax with so much cover it looks like I went insane and caged a plastic bush for a pet. It would be a cheaper pet now that I think on it.
2nd - All imports are dehydrated. Period. Keep that in mind in all things you do for the first two weeks. Feeding. Meds. You name it. I mix Gatoraid 50/50 with water in my drips. The animals get two drips a day for 30 mins a pop. There is also a mister set up with 5 mistings a day for 1-3 mins a pop. They get the gator aid mix for about a week.
3rd - Temps. This is going to sound contrary to #2. However it works for me and has for decades. I have observed that Montane chams are not quite as delicate as some people think. When any species of reptile is sick you up the temps a tad and keep the temps stable. I keep my Quads at 82F and considering all the water they get I have not had to worry about about blowing out kidneys or that stuff. Night temps only drop to about 76F and for a sick Montane animal those ranges are solid.
4th - Sunlight! I have noticed a huge amount of differences between the imported animal and my CBB quads. My CBB animals don't tend to bask when I put them outside for a few days. The import just gets out there and suns herself. Imports I have noticed over the years always sun themselves for a bit. We all know the benefits of this, after about 14 days of relaxing with a caged plastic bush and getting hydrated I put my imports outside for 12 hours of sunlight, at my home the sunning cages get sunlight for 4 hours in the morning so I'll leave them outside for three days straight weather permitting. Imports need that, the artificial lighting doesn't cut it for them at first, or maybe ever, but they really need it for the first few months after importation.
5th - Meds! There is NOT a single import out there that will ever come in to the country without hitchhikers. Internal parasites! External parasites! Internal parasites that work their way outside to become external parasites! Parasites! Moar Parasites!!!! They're everywhere!!!!
So WTH do you do? Treat the animal and kill it because it's an import? Let me tell you the second option, don't treat it and you kill it 100% of the time. In this case, Bill went above and beyond and took a bunch of fecal samples in to Dr. Greek asap. I commend that. I recommend that. However I didn't need that because I already know I have to treat the animal for parasites. I gave my animal two days to relax, hide with the plastic caged bush, drink, fed her only gut loaded items (don't give an import dusted items for the first few weeks), then I put a dab of Panacur on one cricket and watched her eat it. Write down the date. Do it again in 10 days.
Now what WAS helpful from the results of the fecal was seeing that this shipment had an ungodly heavy parasite load. What does that mean? Does it help knowing that? I'm new to this hobby so what does it matter if it had a light load or a heavy one? You just said all imports have hitchhikers so who cares how bad the load is?
It means the difference between you having to keep a close eye out for a crash in a 20-45 day window or the animal most likely not needing much help from you as you acclimate it.
Since I knew the load was heavy, seen the 20-45 day window in the past, I warned folks about it. I think I was speaking a foreign language.
Around day 35 which was mid January for me the crash started. It was about a week after the third dose of Panacur. The female had been doing fine, gained a couple grams, was eating every other day, drinking daily, colors were "ok" one day and then the next day the colors went to a pale green with a little tinge of yellow/green. She wasn't feeling good. She might as well just have held up a handwritten sign saying "my tummy hurts".
Now I will not pretend to know exactly what is wrong at this point. I have been told by educated people the animal may be suffering from toxins due to the dead parasite load. Others an infection from dead parasites. Either way I have always fallen back on the same two things: Hydrate with a gator aid mix and give them a general antibiotic. I'm not saying this will work for you the reader, I am sharing what I do which, based on my experience, I am capable of doing. I have over the years had very very good luck with this. My real point is not to tell you how to handle the "crash" but instead to make you aware of it and to catch it when it comes. You don't have three or four days to screw with it. You have about 48 hrs on average I'd say to deal with it.
After a week of being on an antibiotic and having the gator aid mix she pulled up. She was looking rough on the second day of the crash with her colors being sickly and she went off feed for three days. Day four she ate a little, then day five she roared back and ate a stupid amount of food like around 7 food items over the day. By day 8 she was fine.
Feb 20 was the 65 day mark for her here with me. As of this date she has had 4 doses of Panacur at 10 day intervals and is off the stuff. I will take a fecal in when she hits the 90 day mark in March.
Also this March it will be one year since my male Quad, Emperor Ming, came down with a bone infection in his jaw common to his species. He has been on meds for that entire time, gained weight, and overall doing well. Keeping a chameleon alive long term is not easy when it's healthy let alone one that is sick and on meds and it is not an easy feat but it can be done with time, patience, a good reptile vet, and no small amount of personal experience. If any of those factors are lacking then the chances of the animal making it go down.
Best advice: Buy Captive Bred chameleons. Support those who have the skill and time and money to breed these neat animals so we don't need imported animals often.
Attached is a picture of the imported female as of last week.
Despite my personal feelings I'll give it a try, once.
In Dec I went in on the 1st large Quad import. Room being limited I only picked up one female. When I went out to see the animals sent to us on the west coast I got to see Bill's set up at his home (Dragon Strand). I was quite impressed. His set ups were top notch. He was well prepared for a bunch of imports. Despite that it clear to me at least one animal was at death's door. No amount of prep work can overcome a near death import.
I saw Bill had the short end of the stick as well as having is hands full. I asked which female was the best. He showed it to me. Then I surprised him by asking him for the second best since he needed the best one to off set the one at death's door in my opinion. The second best was really the second best upon inspection. She looked "ok" for an import and home we went.
So how did I know "she looked ok for an import"? That's the first part of learning how to work with imports and the first part of this lecture.
I had over the years of working in the pet industry the unpleasant experience of going directly to my reptile wholesalers and seeing first hand how many animals in a shipment would be in bad shape or "not suitable for sale". If anybody tells you as an importer all their animals are great upon arrival then something is very out of the norm. During these years of seeing multiple imported chameleons I didn't just walk in and buy a few for the pet stores I managed and just walk out. I would look at the animals, compare them, get some hands on experience with some of the visual cues for the differences between stressed animals and really sick ones. How can a person do that??? Well the only practical way and it's not 100% is to simply make sure the animal is alone and not within sight of other chameleons. After about 15 mins alone most chams will relax enough and show you their non stressed colors. Most species have a color/pattern that will tell you they are not feeling well. After I could see that then I'd select animals that had decent body weight and eyes that were not sunken while also looking for serious issues in the limbs, mouth, tail and toes.
Again, nothing is perfect with an import but these are things things I do when looking at chams and did while at Bill's house. He had one goner for sure and none of the females were a sure thing. His males were in better shape at a glance. All that said, I took my chances and took the second best female home.
At home, I do things contrary to what many other keepers do. Hence keeping to myself since I don't need any aggravation from other people.
1st - no huge cages. I have a nice 18"x18"x18" cube cage set up with plastic plants. Easy to clean. Plenty of cover. Imports need a huge amount of cover so they can relax. It's not on display and I only need to check on it once a day anyway, might as well just let it relax with so much cover it looks like I went insane and caged a plastic bush for a pet. It would be a cheaper pet now that I think on it.
2nd - All imports are dehydrated. Period. Keep that in mind in all things you do for the first two weeks. Feeding. Meds. You name it. I mix Gatoraid 50/50 with water in my drips. The animals get two drips a day for 30 mins a pop. There is also a mister set up with 5 mistings a day for 1-3 mins a pop. They get the gator aid mix for about a week.
3rd - Temps. This is going to sound contrary to #2. However it works for me and has for decades. I have observed that Montane chams are not quite as delicate as some people think. When any species of reptile is sick you up the temps a tad and keep the temps stable. I keep my Quads at 82F and considering all the water they get I have not had to worry about about blowing out kidneys or that stuff. Night temps only drop to about 76F and for a sick Montane animal those ranges are solid.
4th - Sunlight! I have noticed a huge amount of differences between the imported animal and my CBB quads. My CBB animals don't tend to bask when I put them outside for a few days. The import just gets out there and suns herself. Imports I have noticed over the years always sun themselves for a bit. We all know the benefits of this, after about 14 days of relaxing with a caged plastic bush and getting hydrated I put my imports outside for 12 hours of sunlight, at my home the sunning cages get sunlight for 4 hours in the morning so I'll leave them outside for three days straight weather permitting. Imports need that, the artificial lighting doesn't cut it for them at first, or maybe ever, but they really need it for the first few months after importation.
5th - Meds! There is NOT a single import out there that will ever come in to the country without hitchhikers. Internal parasites! External parasites! Internal parasites that work their way outside to become external parasites! Parasites!
Moar Parasites!!!! They're everywhere!!!! So WTH do you do? Treat the animal and kill it because it's an import? Let me tell you the second option, don't treat it and you kill it 100% of the time. In this case, Bill went above and beyond and took a bunch of fecal samples in to Dr. Greek asap. I commend that. I recommend that. However I didn't need that because I already know I have to treat the animal for parasites. I gave my animal two days to relax, hide with the plastic caged bush, drink, fed her only gut loaded items (don't give an import dusted items for the first few weeks), then I put a dab of Panacur on one cricket and watched her eat it. Write down the date. Do it again in 10 days.
Now what WAS helpful from the results of the fecal was seeing that this shipment had an ungodly heavy parasite load. What does that mean? Does it help knowing that? I'm new to this hobby so what does it matter if it had a light load or a heavy one? You just said all imports have hitchhikers so who cares how bad the load is?
It means the difference between you having to keep a close eye out for a crash in a 20-45 day window or the animal most likely not needing much help from you as you acclimate it.
Since I knew the load was heavy, seen the 20-45 day window in the past, I warned folks about it. I think I was speaking a foreign language.
Around day 35 which was mid January for me the crash started. It was about a week after the third dose of Panacur. The female had been doing fine, gained a couple grams, was eating every other day, drinking daily, colors were "ok" one day and then the next day the colors went to a pale green with a little tinge of yellow/green. She wasn't feeling good. She might as well just have held up a handwritten sign saying "my tummy hurts".
Now I will not pretend to know exactly what is wrong at this point. I have been told by educated people the animal may be suffering from toxins due to the dead parasite load. Others an infection from dead parasites. Either way I have always fallen back on the same two things: Hydrate with a gator aid mix and give them a general antibiotic. I'm not saying this will work for you the reader, I am sharing what I do which, based on my experience, I am capable of doing. I have over the years had very very good luck with this. My real point is not to tell you how to handle the "crash" but instead to make you aware of it and to catch it when it comes. You don't have three or four days to screw with it. You have about 48 hrs on average I'd say to deal with it.
After a week of being on an antibiotic and having the gator aid mix she pulled up. She was looking rough on the second day of the crash with her colors being sickly and she went off feed for three days. Day four she ate a little, then day five she roared back and ate a stupid amount of food like around 7 food items over the day. By day 8 she was fine.
Feb 20 was the 65 day mark for her here with me. As of this date she has had 4 doses of Panacur at 10 day intervals and is off the stuff. I will take a fecal in when she hits the 90 day mark in March.
Also this March it will be one year since my male Quad, Emperor Ming, came down with a bone infection in his jaw common to his species. He has been on meds for that entire time, gained weight, and overall doing well. Keeping a chameleon alive long term is not easy when it's healthy let alone one that is sick and on meds and it is not an easy feat but it can be done with time, patience, a good reptile vet, and no small amount of personal experience. If any of those factors are lacking then the chances of the animal making it go down.
Best advice: Buy Captive Bred chameleons. Support those who have the skill and time and money to breed these neat animals so we don't need imported animals often.
Attached is a picture of the imported female as of last week.
