Megana chasing Herc out of the free range?

[Chameleons Northwest]

Last week I observed Megana following Hercules around the free range in what appeared to be a stalking pattern. He would be resting or basking and she would approach from the other side of the range. He would see her approach and leave his perch by a different vine. She would see him do this and change vines to continue following him. He would go to a branch on the outer edges of the range and stay there. She would then settle down and roost in a spot that blocked his entrance into the range. He would sit there, away from the basking areas, cold, and that's where I would find him the next day. I observed this twice. Several times I have not been in there long enough during the day to observe their behavior, but I have found him out on a cold perimeter, sometimes cold, damp, and asleep. I got home this afternoon to find him in that condition. It was about 5PM so I let him be. The other day I placed him up by his basking area when I found him out in the perimeter.

Question: Is Megana driving him out of the range? Or is she approaching for friendly reasons, and Hercules is misinterpreting her motives (probably not- I assume that she has approached him when I was not around and made her motives clear)? At twice his size she is pretty intimidating. I think I'm feeding her enough. She's over 500g now. She gets 2 large and 2 medium dubias a day. But she also eats Hercules' food.

Should I intervene? Let them work this out? Separate them? On the plus side Hercules' color still looks good. He does eat. We weighed him and he has not lost any weight. I'm willing to let this go and see if they work it out.

I am hoping someone will tell me this is normal behavior. But, at face value, it appears that Megana is trying to take over the entire range for herself.

I am going out to the free range now to add another basking area to that outer perimeter.

 

[Julirs]

What in the world is 500 grams?

 

[Nicodemayo]

Are these melleri your talking about?

 

[Sepioteuthis]

Yes, she's talking about melleri.

I have seen a female chase a male that was trying to court her. And she wouldn't just chase the male during the attempted courtship, but whenever she saw him. After a week of that I took the male out of the freerange for a few days and when I put him back in everything was ok again. This was in my old freerange where I didn't have visual barriers installed.

What I would try first in your case is put up a visual barrier in the free range with basking and misting spots at both sides. In my experience melleri (male or female) will stop chasing another (male or female) once the other one disappears out of view.
The divider doesn't have to really stop them from getting on eachothers side of the freerange, it's just to give them some privacy.

If the divider doesn't solve the problem you might have to separate them or increase the size of the freerange.

Also how big is the free range?

good luck,
Suzanne

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Somehow my reply appeared twice. Sorry. Anyway, since I took up this space, I will load photos here. These are not recent photos.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Yes, these are our Meller's. Hercules weighs about 250g and Megana weighs about 510g.

Thank you, Suzanne, for your response. It is an "L" shape, 8ft long on the "long leg" by 4ft on the short leg of the "L". The plants are on 20" shelves, but the plants are large, with thick horizontal herp vines running through and across them, making the range several feet deep. When Megana was first placed in there with Hercules, I had green mesh visual dividers but they tore them down. It's funny, when this happened I forgot about the visual barriers, and why I had them in there in the first place. Now that you wrote, I remember reading about your setup, and placing them in mine because it worked for you. I will replace them this morning. I'll let you know if this works!

 

[Sepioteuthis]

That should be plenty big enough for 2 - mine is only 5 ft longer and I have 4 mellere in there (and one, Dume, is almost as big as Megana!).
I've finally started to upgrade my crappy towel dividers with burlap ones that are held in place by wooden dowels attached to the 'lighting cage' at the top and the free range floor at the bottom. (for those having a hard time visualizing this whole lighting cage and free range floor crap; check out my article in the latest chameleonnews e-zine )

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

It is a great article. I would love to breed Megana with a beast like Dume. But Meller's aren't like panthers, one can't do quicky breeding loans. Hercules was adult when we got him, but quite small for a Meller's. He's the first one we got, and I had always read about them being large, but I thought to myself "he's really not that much larger than our largest Panther cham". Then Megana arrived, and I was so taken aback by her size and strength. I wonder, considering his size, if Megana will even allow him to mate with her. We will likely add to our group by-and-by. We have another room we can expand into.

 

[Sepioteuthis]

My other three adults (2 CB and 1 WC) are all about Hercules' size, FWIW.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Oh, OK, so he's normal. I was afraid, after seeing Megana, that Herc was a runt. In most of my photos, you can't tell the size difference. Someday, when they are side-by-side, I'll get photos. His head could easily fit in her mouth. And, I think he knows it.

 

[studiocham]

Oh, OK, so he's normal. I was afraid, after seeing Megana, that Herc was a runt. In most of my photos, you can't tell the size difference. Someday, when they are side-by-side, I'll get photos. His head could easily fit in her mouth. And, I think he knows it.

Ha! Same situation here. He courts, but if she starts the countertesting, he goes green and moves to "his" area. He is 2/3 the size the female, both in a 3 x 5 x 7' walk-in enclosure.

The other two females from Megana's shipment are in the 3-400's. I had to cut them back to handfeeding because they were gorging at the bucket, getting too heavy too fast, and defecating like small dogs daily, instead of every other day or so. It sounds like Megana is eating a lot. She may be developing eggs at that weight. Has she started to gray or fade out?

I am not standing there, observing them within their context, but it sounds like she's eggy and wants him to get lost. In the pic, he's so cute and hopeful in his courtship suit.

 

[Sepioteuthis]

Ya know what... In that picture Herc looks an aweful lot like my female, Merline and Megana looks like my male, Dume. Color- and size-wise.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Ha! Same situation here. He courts, but if she starts the countertesting, he goes green and moves to "his" area. He is 2/3 the size the female, both in a 3 x 5 x 7' walk-in enclosure.

The other two females from Megana's shipment are in the 3-400's. I had to cut them back to handfeeding because they were gorging at the bucket, getting too heavy too fast, and defecating like small dogs daily, instead of every other day or so. It sounds like Megana is eating a lot. She may be developing eggs at that weight. Has she started to gray or fade out?

I am not standing there, observing them within their context, but it sounds like she's eggy and wants him to get lost. In the pic, he's so cute and hopeful in his courtship suit.

It is definitely a change in behavior for her. But she has not begun to gray or fade out. She only looks lumpy when she is vertical. Will she develop her eggs and then want to mate? Or, will she develop her eggs and then deposit them without mating? Or, are you saying she has tried to mate with him, but he gets scared and runs off? If she and Herc did mate, it would have been weeks ago, and we likely would have seen her color changing by now, I guess.

She is good about hand feeding, so I will hand feed her. Can you recommend a proper amount? She's been getting dubias- 2 of the largest nymph size (about 1 1/2" long and 2 smaller nymphs). And then she will occasionally clean out Herc's dish too. But I can hand feed him, too, I think, although he doesn't take it as readily as she does.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Meganas colors today

This photo was taken a few minutes ago, showing Meganas colors.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

I put up the barrier this morning. This afternoon I decided to do some video at their range. Herc saw me and came to the edge and climbed up my arm. Megana saw that and she crossed over and came to the edge and pursued him up my arm! That's pretty extreme behavior.

I put them back in. One on each end of the range, with the barrier between them. Megana crossed over, climbed the barrier, and crossed Herc's area and climbed up to where he was basking. He first went to turn away and climb down the otherside. he then must have had a change of heart, because he suddenly spun around, stuck his lobes up (both of them) and began flicking them. He also puffed up a bit and enlarged the gular a bit. Megana IMMEDIATELY backed off, went down about 4 feet and over about 2 feet and sat there. I set up the video and came inside. I am headed back out there now to see if she retreated to her area or challenged him again.

What does she want? Her own place? Or is she trying to initiate something?

 

[Sepioteuthis]

I'm out of ideas right now, but very curious to hear how this develops!

 

[studiocham]

Megana IMMEDIATELY backed off, went down about 4 feet and over about 2 feet and sat there. I set up the video and came inside. I am headed back out there now to see if she retreated to her area or challenged him again.

What does she want? Her own place? Or is she trying to initiate something?

Sounds like she is counter-testing... if she truly wanted him out, I don't think she would back down from a smaller melleri.

Some receptive females do the "chase me" thing, where they get real close to a male, get him to display, then casually "escape" at a slow pace, all the while keeping an eye on the male, and being very bright leaf green with no spots. How fast did she move away? Was she falling all over herself to get away, or more casual? Spots?

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

I have it on video. As soon as I can remember how to get it uploaded I'll let you know. I'm pretty sure she fell all over herself when he turned on her that way. But she didn't go far.

 

[Chameleons Northwest]

Video of Herc standing up to Meg

Here is the video of Hercules standing up to Megana. She enters from the center left of the screen. (View it on full screen. SHe is very leaf green and difficult to see. He is in dark/light stripes). He backs off and turns away and then changes his mind and confronts her. She heads down into the branches and stays there for awhile. This is a short clip. After this episode she stays down there, then slowly slips up to where Herc is and sits there right below him for about an hour. Just humbly sitting there near him, without either challenging the other. That is covered on another video.

http://[URL=http://s285.photobucket.com/albums/ll46/chameleonsnw/?action=view&current=hercstands1.flv] [/URL]

 

[studiocham]

Wow, he was angry. Notice how he rapidly straightened his tail out behind him, partially coiled at the end? Males challenging males will do that, coiling and uncoiling the tail, and knocking the coiled end like a clenched fist.

She didn't drop to the cage floor or run, and she didn't get all dark from what I can see. I think she's courting him by counter-testing. The fact that she chose to stay near, below him and bright green is pretty receptive behavior. If she had been really frightened by him, she'd be all-black and dropping like a stone to get away from him.

Again, great that you have vid capabilities, very helpful!