Lighting and Food

[v3iledchameleon]

Hi everyone I hope you are having a good day. I have just a few questions because I'm getting my chameleon this upcoming weekend...

1. My chameleon's enclosure will be located on my desk in my room. We bought him a fogger, basically it converts water into fog and that creates moisture for him to drink. At night, I turn my fan on before I go to sleep. It creates a breeze and it can be kind of cool (not to cold though) and I don't want him to get cold. My question is, how can I prevent him from being cold? I have a blue bulb and a UVB bulb, which light should I get him to keep him warm? A side note, a bunch of different websites say different temperatures, what is a healthy temperature to keep him at?

2. What herbs (if any) are they allowed to have? I'm pretty sure they can have kale, I want to give him the best diet he can get.

3. I know what they need to eat and everything. But I want to give him the best diet that he can have, so what is, I guess, a good diet to give him?
I planned on only giving him crickets and mealworms twice a month (due to them being really high in calories), also I'll be giving him fruit flies because he is just a baby. (I have some vitamin dust, and a few food samples. Also if you know of any really good things to feed them in their youth, adult, or both please tell me.

I may attach pictures of what I have. Thanks!

 

[Andee]

Forgers are good for keeping humidity up, but don't create enough moisture for them to really drink, you need an automatic mister for that or need to hand mist. You need lots of branches for him or her to walk on, and so much foliage you could easily lose your chameleon in it. I assume you have a baby cage, eventually you will have to upgrade to 24x24x48 at least. At night their Temps can go down to 50 and they will be fine, in fact it's healthy. No lights should be on at night. You need a lot more types of feeders, likely your chameleon will be too old to eat fruit flies, they eat other types of flies though, they sell the spikes online and all you have to do is pupate them. There are roaches you can feed them of multiple species, way better feeder than crickets, isopods are good feeders, stick insects, silkworms, hornworms, black soldier fly larvae, super worms, certain moths and butterflies, grasshoppers or locusts depending where you are, mantids. As a veiled he can also eat fruits and veggies, but as a baby or juvenile they are less likely to.

 

[Stinger]

Forgers are good for keeping humidity up, but don't create enough moisture for them to really drink, you need an automatic mister for that or need to hand mist. You need lots of branches for him or her to walk on, and so much foliage you could easily lose your chameleon in it. I assume you have a baby cage, eventually you will have to upgrade to 24x24x48 at least. At night their Temps can go down to 50 and they will be fine, in fact it's healthy. No lights should be on at night. You need a lot more types of feeders, likely your chameleon will be too old to eat fruit flies, they eat other types of flies though, they sell the spikes online and all you have to do is pupate them. There are roaches you can feed them of multiple species, way better feeder than crickets, isopods are good feeders, stick insects, silkworms, hornworms, black soldier fly larvae, super worms, certain moths and butterflies, grasshoppers or locusts depending where you are, mantids. As a veiled he can also eat fruits and veggies, but as a baby or juvenile they are less likely to.

The Best feeders ,that I have been using is BSFL. Black soldier Fly Larvae.
The calcium to phosphorus ratio is perfect 2 to 1. Your able to store them in the fridge side door butter tray. They attract your chameleon wiggling . They will eventually morph to flies that don't bite .
Check out the BSFL ( Black Soldier Flies )

 

[Andee]

It's not recommended to store black soldier flies in a fridge unless you have it down lower than the usual for human food.

 

[v3iledchameleon]

Forgers are good for keeping humidity up, but don't create enough moisture for them to really drink, you need an automatic mister for that or need to hand mist. You need lots of branches for him or her to walk on, and so much foliage you could easily lose your chameleon in it. I assume you have a baby cage, eventually you will have to upgrade to 24x24x48 at least. At night their Temps can go down to 50 and they will be fine, in fact it's healthy. No lights should be on at night. You need a lot more types of feeders, likely your chameleon will be too old to eat fruit flies, they eat other types of flies though, they sell the spikes online and all you have to do is pupate them. There are roaches you can feed them of multiple species, way better feeder than crickets, isopods are good feeders, stick insects, silkworms, hornworms, black soldier fly larvae, super worms, certain moths and butterflies, grasshoppers or locusts depending where you are, mantids. As a veiled he can also eat fruits and veggies, but as a baby or juvenile they are less likely to.

Thank you so much! I am a student, so I go to school for 8 hours. So hand misting is not really an option lol. I will try various options, besides the fogger because it does drop a lot of water. In the pet stores when I was shopping, they had the little dippers and I didn't think that would work very well. I will feed him every morning before I got to school. Again thank you so much for the reply, I'm really nervous and just want to make sure he is in the best care possible.

 

[v3iledchameleon]

The Best feeders ,that I have been using is BSFL. Black soldier Fly Larvae.
The calcium to phosphorus ratio is perfect 2 to 1. Your able to store them in the fridge side door butter tray. They attract your chameleon wiggling . They will eventually morph to flies that don't bite .
Check out the BSFL ( Black Soldier Flies )

Thank you so much! I will do my research on them!

 

[Stinger]

It's not recommended to store black soldier flies in a fridge unless you have it down lower than the usual for human food.

They are stored in there containers with used old coffee grounds or Oat Brand.
They are safe from Food in the fridge lol. Kept in the bottom crisper. Even my Wine cooler .

 

[Andee]

Thank you so much! I am a student, so I go to school for 8 hours. So hand misting is not really an option lol. I will try various options, besides the fogger because it does drop a lot of water. In the pet stores when I was shopping, they had the little dippers and I didn't think that would work very well. I will feed him every morning before I got to school. Again thank you so much for the reply, I'm really nervous and just want to make sure he is in the best care possible.

If they had it on enough to create water on the leaves that means they had it on for too long. Too much humidity can cause upper respiratory infections, your cage needs to dry out in between mistings. So it should drop around 50-60% and then should jump up around 80% when misted.

 

[Andee]

They are stored in there containers with used old coffee grounds or Oat Brand.
They are safe from Food in the fridge lol. Kept in the bottom crisper. Even my Wine cooler .

No I meant the usual Temps for keeping food at usually kills or dries out bsfl.

 

[Kristen Wilkins]

Hi everyone I hope you are having a good day. I have just a few questions because I'm getting my chameleon this upcoming weekend...

1. My chameleon's enclosure will be located on my desk in my room. We bought him a fogger, basically it converts water into fog and that creates moisture for him to drink. At night, I turn my fan on before I go to sleep. It creates a breeze and it can be kind of cool (not to cold though) and I don't want him to get cold. My question is, how can I prevent him from being cold? I have a blue bulb and a UVB bulb, which light should I get him to keep him warm? A side note, a bunch of different websites say different temperatures, what is a healthy temperature to keep him at?

2. What herbs (if any) are they allowed to have? I'm pretty sure they can have kale, I want to give him the best diet he can get.

3. I know what they need to eat and everything. But I want to give him the best diet that he can have, so what is, I guess, a good diet to give him?
I planned on only giving him crickets and mealworms twice a month (due to them being really high in calories), also I'll be giving him fruit flies because he is just a baby. (I have some vitamin dust, and a few food samples. Also if you know of any really good things to feed them in their youth, adult, or both please tell me.

I may attach pictures of what I have. Thanks!

I would stay away from mealworms all together . Crickets are fine if you use a good gutload . Superworms , silkworms, hornworms , doobie roaches are all excellent . Silkworms and hornworms Are great for hydration . For fruits and veggies Collard greens , Dandyline greens , sweet potato , Red sweet bell pepper , carrots , raspberries and strawberries are all great . Don't be surprised if you're guy doesn't want to eat anything that doesn't move . The fogger won't be enough hydration you can set up a dropper . You can use a water bottle poke a hole in it and give it a test run to see how it drips like over night .