little nosy be update!

[cla2806]

So after seeing urkel eat a cricket for the first time in weeks ,I decided to move him into a bigger cage but I'm not sure if that was a good idea, I set up a feeding cup with crickets so I could make sure he's eating and I saw him starting to get close to it but still hasn't tried to eat out of it.. he is active but has fallen from the sides a couple times its an 18x18x36 he was in one a foot shorter. Should I give him some time or move him back into the old one?

 

[camimom]

he may be too big for the screen to crawl on. (once they get to a certain size.. they are just too big to climb the screen)

just provide lots of stuff to climb on, vines, branches, etc.

also, hes getting used to his new cage, so it may take him a few days to start cup feeding.

 

[cla2806]

So I threw some crickets in there to roam since I know he really likes to hunt, he is still trying to eat and I don't think he's ate anything since that one cricekt a couple days ago, I noticed that he seems to hesitate when a cricket gets within range , I saw him shoot and miss this morning. Is this related to the over supplementing? Is there something I should do?

 

[carol5208]

They will miss every once in a while. If it is a constant thing, then yes there is some type of problem. If that is the case, it could be something having to do with Vit A deficiency and he is not focusing his eyes properly. You said "after seeing him eat for the first time in weeks"... so he has not been eating or that is the first time you actually saw him eat? How old is your chameleon??? I put my guy in a 18 X 30 X 36 from day one at about 4 months old and he never had a problem eating the crickets that were let loose. What size are the crickets you are feeding?

 

[cla2806]

I had my supplements mixed up, you can read my.first thread if you would like to catch up on the story but basically I was giving him too much d3 and overdosed the poor guy. After about a month of me giving him tiny amounts of food everyday I saw him eat again, he is very interested in the crickets, I moved him to a new cage a couple days ago its an 18x.18x36 urkel is 8 months old or so but from looking around and conparing hes the size of a 4 month old chameleon , I'm hoping he will continue yo grow and I havent damaged him permanently. Im feeding him small/medium crickets. He ate a pretty good sized one when he hat a couple days ago so I'm thinking that size may not be the problem. I do notice one of his eyes is more bulgy then the other not by a huge amount but I can tell.

 

[oldskoolmodder]

Have you tried anything other then crickets? I'm pretty grateful my guy loves crickets, but he will literally charge the other side of the cage for a hornworm or silkworm.

Maybe giving him some crazy colored creepy crawly will entice his appetite?

 

[cla2806]

Well last week before he ate I had dubias and hronworms that I tried to feed no interest at all, maybe because he had never at them before .. bouygues some crickets and he was all.over it.. I'm assuming hes still somewhat weak from the ordeal of stress and not eating properly. Hornworm passed by him plenty of times but be didn't seem interested whatsoever. Dubias were in a cup didn't bother with em.

 

[cla2806]

Been a while!

Hello everyone,
It has been forever and a day since I was last on worrying and hoping Urkel would get better.. and he DID! He slowly started eating again and I eased off of the supplements for a while and got into a good schedule to properly maintain his health. He grew bigger and he looked great. I was feeding a variety of feeders (crickets,silks,horns,supers) and I switched to repashy supplements.

 

[cla2806]

Been a while!

Hello everyone,
It has been forever and a day since I was last on worrying and hoping Urkel would get better.. and he DID! He slowly started eating again and I eased off of the supplements for a while and got into a good schedule to properly maintain his health. He grew bigger and he looked great. I was feeding a variety of feeders (crickets,silks,horns,supers) and I had also switched to Repashy supplements.

Now the issue that I am having is totally my fault, again. I could make a thousand excuses but I basically haven't been varying his feeders, I bought a colony of supers and had been cup feeding him those for a bout a month now (I know I suck). I was buying crickets here and there to feed him but not varying with other feeders as much as I was before. I was dusting the crickets but not the supers, although I was gut loading them weekly (carrots,celery,apples, bananas, whatever I had really.)

So today I threw some crickets in his cage and he was excited as always since he loves crickets. But I noticed he was missing and his tongue is extremely slow and inaccurate. I'm assuming this is due to my lack of supplementation and a lazy tongue from eating supers out of the cup for so long. He was still catching crickets fine up until this week.

My question is how can I can get the supplements back on track if he can't catch dusted crickets? Should I dust the supers and keep on with those and other worms until he gets better?