Kinyongia boehmei

Hi everyone,

This is my first post on the forum, so I'll give a short introduction on myself.
My name is Ferdy, I'm a wildlife management student from the Netherlands and I've been keeping chameleons since 2001. My current collection consists of R. brevicaudatus, T. quadricornis, montium, deremensis and of course K. boehmei :)

I acquired a boehmei pair in March 2011 and they have been doing quite well, so I thought I'd share some experiences and photo's.
I keep my pair separately, both in a glass terrarium measuring 50 x 50 x 73cm (in inches that's 19,7 x 19,7 x 28,7). The terraria are decorated with Ficus benjamina, small palm trees (looks a bit like Areca palms, but I can't remember the actual name), Philodendron and numerous branches of course. You can see the male's terrarium on the first photo.
Lighting (mounted outside the terrarium) consists of two spotlights (40W and 25W) and a True-Light UV-bulb.The temperature inside is 22-23 degrees C (71,6-73,4 F), with a basking site of about 28 degrees C (82,4 F) and humidity lies between 60-70%. I mist the boehmei's once a day, which seems more than enough, since they always walk away from the water. I rarely see them drink... I feed them every other day, mostly crickets and beetles, but they're particularly fond of flying insects as well. A really interesting behavioral aspect I've observed a number of times (in both the male and female) is that they occasionally grasp a cricket sticking out of their mouth, using one of their front paws. It seems they know the cricket can't escape by doing this or something. A friend of mine observed about the same thing in K. tavetana.
At this moment I have two clutches of eggs from them, the first one from 3 May 2011 and the second from yesterday :) Gestation lasted 49 and 62 days respectively (measured from the last day on which the pair mated until the day the eggs were laid). I incubate them at temperatures of about 21 degrees C (69,8 F) during the day and about 18 degrees C (64,4 F) at night.

I think that's about enough information. I'll keep you updated if something interesting occurs (hatching eggs for example, though I have no clue how long that will take). Hope you enjoy the photo's!

The male's terrarium:
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The male itself:
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The pair during a mating:
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The female:
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Two egg clutches -the one on the left is 5 months old, the one on the right is 1 day old:
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Great post, and good observations. You commented on boehmei grasping the feeder with the front foot and you also saw this behavior in tavetana as well. That's interesting, because my male Kinyongia multituberculata has done the same thing and I haven't ever seen this behavior in the other genus of chameleons I have. Kinyongia are indeed quite an interesting group of chameleons to work with. Welcome to the forum.
 
Welcome; great first post! There are a lot of Kinyongia enthusiasts on here who will be very interested in your animals and your project.
 
I have also seen the food grasping with K. multituberculata. It is like they are eating a chicken leg.

Wow! 62 day gestation is very long. I have it occasionally happen with multituberculata as well. I think some say it is a biological delay by the female for some reason. Normally I have a 30 day gestation.

Thank you so much for breeding this species, taking great photos, having a nice setup and of course sharing it with us!

Do you want to join the Kinyongia Chameleon Keepers?
 
You commented on boehmei grasping the feeder with the front foot and you also saw this behavior in tavetana as well. That's interesting, because my male Kinyongia multituberculata has done the same thing and I haven't ever seen this behavior in the other genus of chameleons I have. Kinyongia are indeed quite an interesting group of chameleons to work with. Welcome to the forum.

I have also seen this in my K. matschiei. He would grab the larger prey(katydids, grasshoppers & dragonflies) and hold on to it while he munched on the head.:eek:
 
Great post! I am pretty interested in this species and might be my next type of Kinyongia to keep. Keep us updated.
 
Those are great pictures! Welcome to the forum, with pictures like that I hope to see a lot of you and your chams.
 
Thank you for posting and sharing your gorgeous chameleons with us. The very best of luck with the eggs. Jann
 
Those eggs look good! I also have two clutches from two separate pairings. The first clutch looks to be about the same size as yours and they are 6 months into incubation at this point. They are incubating just where the females laid them in the terrarium (I can see them through the glass) and they are growing larger. I am not sure how long it will take for them to hatch. Judging from Jared's experience with his tavs, I think 8-10 months.

I have also seen the "eating a chicken leg" behavior in both my boehmeis and the tavetanas. Interesting. Do you notice that your boehmeis walk around on the ground especially in the mornings? I do not notice this with my tavs, but the boehmeis seems to enjoy morning outings in the dirt. :)
 
Great looking pair and congrats on the successful breeding and laying!! This species is really really cool!! I just love the females!!

Now that it is mentioned, it seems I have noticed the whole grabbing food items more in some of the Kinyongia than other species. Never really noticed until now though.

Ive not hatched this species but I have hatched tavetana which may or may not be similar. With the temperatures you are incubating at now I would suspect around 10 to 11 months if incubation is close to tavetana.

Please, do not be stingy with the pictures:D
 
Those are some nice pictures. You should post pictures of the rest of your chameleons too. I'd love to see your quads and montiums :D.
 
Has anyone of you tried incubation of Kinyongia-eggs with constant temperatures? Dirt averages the day/night temperatures. If I am right, the temperature oscilation in the depth of 20cm is under 1 degree Celsius.
 
Thanks a lot for all the positive replies everyone! :)

Interesting to read some of you have observed the "eating a chicken legg" behavior in other species as well. I have kept matschiei, multituberculata and vosseleri in the past, but I've never seen them do it (though I had a lot less time to observe my chameleons at that time). Must be a Kinyongia feature then.

About the 62 days gestation. Now that I think about it, it would surprise me if this had something to do with the temperature in the female's terrarium. I measured it about a week before she laid the eggs and noticed it was a bit cold (19C / 66,2F). The first time she was gravid was definetly during a warmer period (outside), so the temperature inside her terrarium was higher as well.

Neither the male nor the female walk around on the ground a lot. It happens occasionally, but normally the female walks around throughout the terrarium and the male spends most of his time relaxing on one of his favorite three branches close to the glass, waiting untill I give him a nice, juicy beetle :)

Must be cool to be able to see the eggs incubating through the glass. I wonder how this affects the hatchlings. I remember a paper saying that eggs touching each other while incubating have an advantage over 'single' eggs, because the eggs exchange fluids and gases and thus all develop equally fast (which would result in all of them hatching at the same time as well).

I have never used constant temperatures for Kinyongia eggs, but information about oscilation on a depth of 20 cm might not be the best info to use. In the November 2008 edition of the German society "AG Chamäleons", there is an article written by John Measey about K. boehmei in the wild. He wrote that boehmei females lay their eggs at depths of 7,5-15 cm. I also remember some information about temperature oscilation from another source. I believe it said that the temperature on a depth of 8 or 10 cm was 17 degrees C in the shade and 19 C in the sun. I can't remember where I read this though. I'll try to find it again.

By the way, I realised I forgot to mention at what temperature I keep them at night. I measured it last night and it was about 18 degrees C (64,6 F).

Thanks again for all your replies! I'll definetly keep the photo's coming and of course I can share some quad and montium pics too :)
 
Well, I have an update, but it's not a positive one. I just found my female dead on the soil in her terrarium... Yesterday she looked fine, I fed her the day before. She did eat a bit less lately, also during the time when she was gravid (2nd clutch). Well, common story I guess. I'm glad she left me with 16 eggs!
 
Well, I have an update, but it's not a positive one. I just found my female dead on the soil in her terrarium... Yesterday she looked fine, I fed her the day before. She did eat a bit less lately, also during the time when she was gravid (2nd clutch). Well, common story I guess. I'm glad she left me with 16 eggs!

That sucks big time. sorry to hear it. Good luck with those eggs
 
Sorry to hear about your female. I love having babies, but it takes so much out of the female. Sometimes it all justs sucks.
 
So sorry to hear about your female. I hope your eggs will hatch successfully.

Do you always place the eggs close to each other the way they are in the photos?

Your name is familiar...did you post on ADCHAM or the afriherps forum?
 
It does suck, but it might also have been due to her age. I bought her in March and she was already adult then. No clue how old she was or how old they can get. Those eggs probably did cost her a lot of energy, but at least there will (hopefully) be a next generation.

So sorry to hear about your female. I hope your eggs will hatch successfully.

Do you always place the eggs close to each other the way they are in the photos?

Your name is familiar...did you post on ADCHAM or the afriherps forum?

Yes, I always place eggs close to each other. It should increase the chance of equal hatching. It seems more natural to me too :)

I never posted on the Afriherp forum. I am on the mailing list but only replied to a couple of messages. As for Adcham, I tried to join once when I was 17 I believe, but I didn't succeed since the minimum age to join was 18.
Maybe you just came across some photo's I posted on Dutch/Belgian cham. forums while google searching?
 
just found this thread, but you have some amazing chams, very sorry to hear about your female, it always is hard to loose one. i too keep t. quadricornis, and deremansis as well as cristatus, and funny you mention the cham handleing the cricket with its foot, i have a veiled with no tounge and have observed him useing his feet to grasp a cricket and put it in his mouth.
its very interesting to see, so human like
welcome and sorry agian, pleased to meet
 
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