Meet Percival!
- Thread starter Mansfield
- Start date
Mansfield
Established Member
I'm such a nervous Cham parent right now...He wandered around for a while, then slowly found the basking site. He immediately climbed on the screen right underneath it and his underside turns almost "burnt" black, thats the only way I can describe it. I panicked and basically startled him away from it and quintuple checked all the temperatures (we are talking about 15 seconds of drama). By the time I looked back at him, he was back to the colors you see above. I'm such a helicopter parent right now!
P.S. His basking temp is controlled via a vivarium electronics VE300 pulse control thermostat set to 82F, with a sensorpush wifi sensor showing 83F at the screen....then using a heat gun all over the place with nothing reaching >85F....this little trickster made me think he was getting burnt!
P.S. His basking temp is controlled via a vivarium electronics VE300 pulse control thermostat set to 82F, with a sensorpush wifi sensor showing 83F at the screen....then using a heat gun all over the place with nothing reaching >85F....this little trickster made me think he was getting burnt!
Mansfield
Established Member
Ha! So true! So....between last night and today, I have watched him just hang out upside down on the top screen.....for basically hours 
One of my worries was that I put a 12% arcadia UVB bulb in due to the cage size. Of course, I went through all the trouble to put his top branch at UVI 3.0-3.5 on my solarmeter....its 9 at the screen. I came home from work today just to see him basking away hanging upside down at the UVB bulb. Enough is enough, I just swapped it out to a 6% bulb, which measures 0.8 at the branch and 3.5 at the screen....guess I will have to stick with this while he is being a daredevil.
One of my worries was that I put a 12% arcadia UVB bulb in due to the cage size. Of course, I went through all the trouble to put his top branch at UVI 3.0-3.5 on my solarmeter....its 9 at the screen. I came home from work today just to see him basking away hanging upside down at the UVB bulb. Enough is enough, I just swapped it out to a 6% bulb, which measures 0.8 at the branch and 3.5 at the screen....guess I will have to stick with this while he is being a daredevil.
Mansfield
Established Member
Ok, 1st week update...wow is each cham different! He has such a spry personality. I swear he is just afraid of everything. Today I went to approach him with my hand for the first time and he literally LEAPED off the branch and into his foliage. I might have actually seen all of his limbs outstretched like a flying squirrel! If he had one, he might have even flipped me the bird on his way into cover! I definitely decided not to pursue, today just isnt the day hahaha. Otherwise, he seems to be eating well. I havent really seen him drink, but he has a lot of water sources in his enclosure every day, and his urates (the ones I can find) are actually perfectly white. He is only eating the crickets and dubias right now, but leaves all worms (superworms and bsfl are also being presented), and he is starting to figure out the feeder cup locations.
Ive only encountered a couple concerns:
1. As noted above, he was hanging around waaaaay to often upside down on the top screen, directly under the 12% UVB bulb the first couple days and wasnt really sticking to the branch that I "calibrated" at 3.5 for him. I measured it as a 9 UVI directly at the screen, so swapped it out for a 6% UVB bulb, which measures as 1.0 at the perch and 3.0 at the screen. Ironically, he has actually taken to the perch way more since I swapped it out. Is that going to be enough UV for him? Should I just strap in another branch that goes directly under the screen, or at least closer?
2. This one was a major concern. I dont think I thought to measure heat directly under my jungle dawn spotlights. I had heard they get warm, but thought it was referring to internal components mostly and thats why they had an internal cooling fan added. After another day with them, I started to note the foliage closest to them was starting to burn (about 2 feet away). So I stuck one of my SensorPush sensors in the 2 inch gap between the light and screen (both jungle dawn lights are pointing directly down from ceiling hooks)...within about 5 minutes it was reading 159F!!! Its the concentrated light beam that produces so much heat! Needless to say, I have completely taken them off the lighting routine and am looking for a solution to anchor them a few feet away and at an angle. Luckily, Percival isnt showing any sign of being burned by them in the short time they were on with him inside the enclosure.
Anyway, thanks for listening and any guidance to share!
Oh and in this first pic you can see the leaves curling where the jungle dawn lights were pointing:
Peekaboo, he's hiding (sorry for the bad pic quality...had to zoom a bit lol)!!
Ive only encountered a couple concerns:
1. As noted above, he was hanging around waaaaay to often upside down on the top screen, directly under the 12% UVB bulb the first couple days and wasnt really sticking to the branch that I "calibrated" at 3.5 for him. I measured it as a 9 UVI directly at the screen, so swapped it out for a 6% UVB bulb, which measures as 1.0 at the perch and 3.0 at the screen. Ironically, he has actually taken to the perch way more since I swapped it out. Is that going to be enough UV for him? Should I just strap in another branch that goes directly under the screen, or at least closer?
2. This one was a major concern. I dont think I thought to measure heat directly under my jungle dawn spotlights. I had heard they get warm, but thought it was referring to internal components mostly and thats why they had an internal cooling fan added. After another day with them, I started to note the foliage closest to them was starting to burn (about 2 feet away). So I stuck one of my SensorPush sensors in the 2 inch gap between the light and screen (both jungle dawn lights are pointing directly down from ceiling hooks)...within about 5 minutes it was reading 159F!!! Its the concentrated light beam that produces so much heat! Needless to say, I have completely taken them off the lighting routine and am looking for a solution to anchor them a few feet away and at an angle. Luckily, Percival isnt showing any sign of being burned by them in the short time they were on with him inside the enclosure.
Anyway, thanks for listening and any guidance to share!
Oh and in this first pic you can see the leaves curling where the jungle dawn lights were pointing:
Peekaboo, he's hiding (sorry for the bad pic quality...had to zoom a bit lol)!!
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Mansfield
Established Member
Hi everyone! Now a little more than 3 weeks with my new buddy and he seems to be doing well, health-wise. I have only held him once, since he still runs away from me quickly whenever I open his enclosure and displays some agitated colors:
I addressed the UV branch concern by just adding another ghost wood branch over top that raised his perch to within about 5 inches of the light. This measures around a 2 UVI on the solarmeter. I feel this is much safer than having the higher output UV bulb with dangerous levels (recall above, the UVI could get up to 9 if he was hanging from the screen top directly underneath it). Basically the lesson I learned is that if he has access to any danger, heat or UV, no matter what I do to try and stop him he will find a way to get into it! It’s also obvious he doesn’t really know it’s a danger. As for the jungle dawn spotlights, I found what I thought was a solution with the lights about 2-3 feet away and at an angle, but when I measured the focal point with my temp sensor it was still around 97F, so still a little too hot. As people say, these enclosures require constant updating with continuous measurement! I’m just glad I invested in all of the means to measure precisely.
Thanks for listening and as always, any input/critique is welcome!
I addressed the UV branch concern by just adding another ghost wood branch over top that raised his perch to within about 5 inches of the light. This measures around a 2 UVI on the solarmeter. I feel this is much safer than having the higher output UV bulb with dangerous levels (recall above, the UVI could get up to 9 if he was hanging from the screen top directly underneath it). Basically the lesson I learned is that if he has access to any danger, heat or UV, no matter what I do to try and stop him he will find a way to get into it! It’s also obvious he doesn’t really know it’s a danger. As for the jungle dawn spotlights, I found what I thought was a solution with the lights about 2-3 feet away and at an angle, but when I measured the focal point with my temp sensor it was still around 97F, so still a little too hot. As people say, these enclosures require constant updating with continuous measurement! I’m just glad I invested in all of the means to measure precisely.
Thanks for listening and as always, any input/critique is welcome!
Mansfield
Established Member
Hahaha I have to admit, when I was looking for names, yours is where I got the inspiration! Full credit to you!
Mansfield
Established Member
Hi All!
It’s hard to believe it’s been 4 months already! Since these last pics, I’ve added a few more branches and the plants have done awesomely. Percival seems to be doing fantastic in health. He is still very weary of me, though, and runs away when I get too close, which doesn’t really bother me. I’ve only handled him twice now, and both times he was not a fan hahaha. He has taken a liking to BSFL, which is great! Anyway, I was able to get a couple pics, but he HATES the phone:
It’s hard to believe it’s been 4 months already! Since these last pics, I’ve added a few more branches and the plants have done awesomely. Percival seems to be doing fantastic in health. He is still very weary of me, though, and runs away when I get too close, which doesn’t really bother me. I’ve only handled him twice now, and both times he was not a fan hahaha. He has taken a liking to BSFL, which is great! Anyway, I was able to get a couple pics, but he HATES the phone:
Such a beautiful boy he is becoming!
MissSkittles
Chameleon Enthusiast
I wonder if chameleons know just how beautiful they are. Love his greens! ?
Klyde O'Scope
Chameleon Enthusiast
I expect the lady chameleons know how handsome the gentleman chameleons are,
and the gentleman chameleons know how beautiful the lady chameleons are,
or there might not be so many little chameleons! (Or something like that... ? )
Imagine what the chameleons in Lake Wobegon* must be like!
Chameleomom
Chameleon Enthusiast
Good looking little man you have
