Nail Advice please

[Mark_C]

HI folks. Sooooo, my dude occasionally does the hanging on the screen deal, but he's gotten quite big, quite quickly.
He did a bit of a swing down and took a fall.
Fortunately I have a ton of plants so no damage done there.
I did notice that he left a nail behind in the screen, and it looks like it has tissue attached.
Making assumption that he's ripped it out at the base and will henceforth be nail-less.
No major swelling or sign of infection, yet.
So, the Q:
Should I preemptively treat this with antibiotics or just leave it be to see if infection develops?
I'm unsure if this is a situation with chams where there's a high rate of follow up infection or not.
As always, thanks
M

 

[Beman]

If it looks as though tissue came with it then personally I would use a tiny bit of plain neosporin on it each day. The kind without any pain reliever in it. And watch really closely that it does not start to swell.

If he is actively screen climbing though he is high risk for losing more. I would modify the cage to keep this from happening. People use the plastic trellis and plastic flexible garden fencing. I have used the green plastic garden fencing. Hooking it to the inside of the screen with tiny zip ties. As males mature they become more and more active so screen climbing is something that even though they gain weight they still do it.

 

[Ayantis44]

Hi,
I had the same thing happen! Just apply Neosporin and keep it as clean as possible. If there was tissue attached it is likely that the nail will not grow back.

My cham. had outgrown his cage and I haven't had an issue with him climbing since I sized up. If you already have the right size for an adult Cham. you might want to add some more branches or plants to climb on. If that doesn't work, you may have to add something to modify the mesh.

 

[Klyde O'Scope]

Just for corroboration, this has come up before in the archives.

https://www.chameleonforums.com/search/1702287/?q=losing+a+nail&c[title_only]=1&o=relevance
https://www.google.com/search?q=cha...HWIRDc8QrQIoBHoECAoQBQ&biw=1024&bih=625&dpr=1

 

[MzLaurie11]

Poor guy. When my boy got bigger his nails wouldnt fir in the svreen and i was affraid of an accident so i got 1\2 metal welding mesh in the gardening section. One package cover half the cage. Ill add a pic with my new baby on it so you can see. I did cover the edges with tape so no scratches occurred.

 

[Mark_C]

Roger that with the Neosporin sans pain relief.
And really like the idea with the 1/2 inch trellis.
Sorry to post a redundant question, I did look through a few of the previous posts but didn't read anything specifically addressing the problem prophylactically.
Thanks all.

 

[Klyde O'Scope]

Ceiling egg crate. It's good for anchoring branches, dowels, etc.; my little dude loves climbing on it, and no harm to his little tootsies.

If he's climbing on the screened door, very thin acrylic sheet on the inside of the screen. If you still want him to climb on the door, 4 or 5 mesh coated hardware cloth or egg crate, though the egg crate is harder to see through than hardware cloth.