Lumps: food or eggs?

[meshuggahlad]

Hi,
I'm quite new to this forum but started reading it when my girlfriend wanted to get a chameleon. She's now had a female veiled chameleon (Olive) for about a month and she appears happy and healthy. Olive is around 5 months old now and I have a question which I'm hoping someone will be able to answer:

I sometimes see lumps by the ribs near her tail. They aren't always visible and sometimes they seem to move a little as I watch, as if they are being pushed backwards in a ripple motion. I think it is quite possible that these lumps are locusts that have been eaten and are being digested. However sometimes when I look at them they look as if they could be eggs! She is only 5 months old and is nearly always a bright green colour.

Do you think the lumps are just food?

If these lumps are eggs then I would have expected her behaviour to have changed or her colour to have become darker. Or do they spend months producing eggs and they only become gravid a few days before they are going to lay them?

I have attached a photo which shows the lumps clearly. The lumps are only visible when she is in certain positions and usually they are not quite as prominent as in the photo.

At the moment she is eating around 8 to 10 locusts a day which are dusted in plain clacium. She sometimes eats 1 or 2 morio worms instead of a couple of locusts. She gets Zoo med's Reptivite with D3 once a week. She goes to the toilet once a day which consists of an amount of clear liquid with white, and then a long brown bit.

Thank you very much for any help.

 

[Haze1981]

Sorry I don't know what the lumps are. Do you have a laying bin set up for her? I hope someone will be able to help you soon.

 

[meshuggahlad]

She doesn't have a laying bin set up for her yet. She hasn't gone darker and her behaviour hasn't changed so we didn't think we'd have to do that yet. Neither of us have any experience though. We'd read that she should start doing things like walking around the bottom of the vivarium if she wanted to lay eggs.

When a chameleon eats a few locusts or crickets is it normal to see lumps by the ribs? Thanks

 

[shawn_melanson]

If it is eggs just get a laying bin set up it's cheap

 

[fleetwoodchams]

Hi,
I'm quite new to this forum but started reading it when my girlfriend wanted to get a chameleon. She's now had a female veiled chameleon (Olive) for about a month and she appears happy and healthy. Olive is around 5 months old now and I have a question which I'm hoping someone will be able to answer:

I sometimes see lumps by the ribs near her tail. They aren't always visible and sometimes they seem to move a little as I watch, as if they are being pushed backwards in a ripple motion. I think it is quite possible that these lumps are locusts that have been eaten and are being digested. However sometimes when I look at them they look as if they could be eggs! She is only 5 months old and is nearly always a bright green colour.

Do you think the lumps are just food?

If these lumps are eggs then I would have expected her behaviour to have changed or her colour to have become darker. Or do they spend months producing eggs and they only become gravid a few days before they are going to lay them?

I have attached a photo which shows the lumps clearly. The lumps are only visible when she is in certain positions and usually they are not quite as prominent as in the photo.

At the moment she is eating around 8 to 10 locusts a day which are dusted in plain clacium. She sometimes eats 1 or 2 morio worms instead of a couple of locusts. She gets Zoo med's Reptivite with D3 once a week. She goes to the toilet once a day which consists of an amount of clear liquid with white, and then a long brown bit.

Thank you very much for any help.

Set up a laying bin.
Clean plastic container, 1/2 and 1/2 mizture clean rinsed play sand and organic potting soil. Dampened so it sticks together but NOT swampy. At least 5 inches deep so she can dig. I like to cover this bin with a fake plant leaf so she has privacy. There are several threads with pics on this if you do a search.

Also D3 once a week is too much - every 2 weeks is fine. I know some keepers that have chams outdoors all the time in natural UV don't use it at all.

 

[Olimpia]

Those are most likely eggs, you wouldn't see lumps of food matter that far back on her torso, but that's exactly where you see eggs when a female has them. I'd set up a laying bin and leave it in the cage, so she has the option for when she's ready to use it.

Here's a great video on how to set up a laying bin: https://www.chameleonforums.com/laying-bin-set-up-educational-video-77225/

You really want the depth to be much closer to 10-12" deep, because females like to dig deep tunnels and will go all the way down to the bottom of the pot. A 5 gallon bucket is usually a good size for a female veiled, but as you can see in the video there are lots of things you could use to fit your cage as long as they are opaque and a good size.

It can be either playsand, organic top soil, or a combo of both, as long as you make it moist enough to be able to dig a tunnel all the way to the bottom and have it hold. Both mediums are available very cheaply at any home improvement store.

When you see her start to check out the laying bin and maybe start digging around in it, make sure to give her lots of privacy. If she's in a busy room perhaps drape a sheet over the whole cage, so she can't see any activity. It may take her 2-3 days to dig a tunnel she likes, lay the eggs, and cover them back up again so don't worry if it seems like she's not done in one afternoon. When she's done she'll be much thinner, dirty, and tired, typically basking under her light. She'll be hungry and thirsty, so give her plenty of both.

It's not as scary as it sounds! If you have any additional questions just ask, we've all been through the first-time-laying jitters.

 

[meshuggahlad]

Thanks everyone for the replies. I've looked at that video so I have a better idea how to do the laying bin. Olive is still in a juvenile vivarium so we're going to buy her an adult sized one this week so it can fit the bin in ok. I've also told my girlfriend only to feed the vitamins with d3 twice a month.