new 3mo panther not eating

[romulan]

Hi everybody, last saturday I picked up a 3 month old panther from bruce @ chameleon paradise. He seems to have adjusted to his cage nicely (light coloration, basks, roams around). The problem is I don't think he has been eating that much. The first day I got him I witnessed him eat 2 crickets but that was it. He has not responded to silkworms from my hand or when I put them in the cage. I don't want to start him on mealworms because they are hard to digest yet but I bought a few of those to see if he would eat them but no go.

I work from 7a-330 so am not home to see if he eats during this time. However I know he is not eating because his poops are infrequent, and were healthy looking at the start, but the last one I saw him take was small and had mucus on it. This morning I noticed his rib cage is more pronounced.

I am also worried he is not getting calcium and going to suffer MBD...the crickets clean the dust off within a few hours. I am gutloading with dinofuel but is it as effective if he is not eating them in a given time frame? My first chameleon ate like a champ and I would only have to heavy dust one cricket with calcium to get him his daily supplement.

Would chameleons starve themselves to death or do they start eating eventually?

EDIT: i will fill out the cage info sheet when I get home but hes in a 16x16x30 so its not too big..the crickets dont hide either they are all visible to him. If the same number of crickets are still there this afternoon I am going to start really worrying. I picked the smallest of the three faly's I got to choose from so I may just have a runt that is a slow developer. But if he was eating under bruce and not under me then I must be at fault. Will update when I get home this afternoon.

 

[jannb]

Welcome to the forums and congrats on your new baby. A 3 month old should be eating allot, like 10 to 12 SMALL crickets a day. Please fill out the attached form so we can try to help you figure out what's going on with him.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/how-ask-help-66/

 

[romulan]

Chameleon Info:

Your Chameleon - 3 month nosy faly panther, male. Have had him for 1 week
Handling - I do not. What is the point of making him more stressed.
Feeding - Small-med (smaller than his head though) crickets gutloaded with carrots and Dinofuel. Put them in there in the morning. Silkworms one a day.
Supplements - Reptical without D3 every day.
Watering - MistKing on for 5 mins, 3 times a day. Little dripper as well.
Fecal Description - At first his poops had a nice white urate with decent size fecal matter. His poop last night looked runny and small.
History - I got to choose from 3 different faly's. I chose the smallest one so maybe he is a runt/slow developer?


Cage Info:

Cage Type - 16x16x30 screen from LLL
Lighting - reptisun 5.0 uvb 18'', 40W household lightbulb for basking
Temperature - Basking area at top of cage is 88 degrees F. Bottom of cage is 66. (zoo med temp gauge)
Humidity - I have not invested in a humidity gauge but rely on MistKing to keep moisture levels up
Plants - I have a hibiscus plant that I disinfected and repotted before putting it in the cage. Lots of places to hide
Placement - Living room next to window. I keep the blinds open but window closed. Cage is about 2 feet off the ground, putting his highest spot at about 4.5 feet from the ground
Location - San Jose CA


Current Problem - see original post

Unfortunately I came home today and there looks to be about the same number of crickets before I left. However, my dad threw my last silkworm today and said he ate it right away. This is a good sign, and I found a place that sells locusts nearby so I will pick some up soon.

I am still worried he won't get enough nutrition though. Is it okay to dissolve some calcium carb (~100mg in 0.1mL water) and force feed him this with a syringe every day if I do not believe he is eating dusted crickets?

 

[carol5208]

you can dust the silkworms also with calcium.They are excellent feeders. I would not go to the extreme of force feeding.
i don't see anything in your set up that is off that would cause him not to eat.

 

[jannb]

I think the crickets might be too large. They should be no wider than the space between his eyes. I would also lower the basking temps to the low 80's and if you can, bring up the temps on the bottom to low 70's. You are also going to need more supplements one with D3, and multi vitamins with some A in it. What kind of disinfected did you use on the plant? Are you sure that you got it all washed off really good?

Below is a link to my blog for new keepers. I hope it will help you out.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blo...-keepers-young-veiled-panther-chameleons.html

 

[romulan]

Thanks for the quick responses. Jann - for the hibiscus, I first cut any flower buds off, then I filled a bucket with soapy warm water and then inverted the plant in it and swished it around a few times. I used copious amounts of water to rinse it off and used soil with no fertilizers or additives.

It sounds like it could be the size of some of the medium crickets intimidating him? I thought the rule of thumb was no bigger than the size of his head (which none are), but I will remove them immediately and see how exclusively small ones work.

Thanks for the link as well, however this is not my first panther chameleon. I had an ambilobe in college that lived to be 3yrs, but I got him when he was a juvenille (6 months old instead of my 3 month old now). He never had the same feeding issues as my new guy is having

 

[romulan]

Another thought, do you think there is too much going on in his cage? He is always light colored and seems to like it. But Bruce mentioned to me not to have something too crazy.

Also, I would like to share my old ambilobe cross from college, Boski. RIP little man

 

[jannb]

Another thought, do you think there is too much going on in his cage? He is always light colored and seems to like it. But Bruce mentioned to me not to have something too crazy.

Also, I would like to share my old ambilobe cross from college, Boski. RIP little man

Your pictures didn't come through. What happen to Boski? Three years old is not that old for a male panther. You might find the blog helpful.

 

[romulan]

Pictures should work now. I don't mean to sound defensive and was going to check out your blog regardless I am just stressed over the current situation.

As for Boski, I will never know what happened. He started becoming slower and lethargic a week before he passed. I could not afford veterinary care at the time and had nobody I could turn to for help. I cried my eyes out until there were no tears left. Please do not chastise me, I took care of Boski better than I did myself for those years. Now I have stable cash flow

 

[jannb]

Boski was a very handsome little man. I am sorry that you lost him. That's the very hardest part of having a pet.

How big is the cage? Sometimes if it's too large they have a hard time finding their food. You do have allot of stuff in there. You could try thinning it out a bit.

 

[Thechameleonkeeper]

Im NO expert but to me misting for 5 minutes 3 x's a day seems too much, that much humidty can cause resp infection thus the mucus. Do you have a drain for the water to drain out of the cage with?? Also yes that seems about 3 x's too much stuff for the little guy. All that stuff gives crickets a TON of space to hide, and makes it a LOT harder for him to find them. Simple is easy. I too got 1 from bruce, he has a ficus, a few branches and thats it, easy to clean and easy to monitor exactly how much he is eating. Also count the crickets before you put them in there, if you count 10 in, when u get home from work count them, less than 10 eating, 10, not. Good Luck

 

[ataraxia]

Boski was a very handsome little man. I am sorry that you lost him. That's the very hardest part of having a pet.

How big is the cage? Sometimes if it's too large they have a hard time finding their food. You do have allot of stuff in there. You could try thinning it out a bit.

I think jann hit it right on the head. Cage may be just a tad bit to large for him to find the crickets. I personally like to start chams at that age in a 16x15x20 cage.

If the crickets are just a tad bit to big. Pinch the rear legs at the knees. they will then fall off making the cricket appear smaller and it will also move muc hslower. I would release these onto the side screen.

 

[ataraxia]

Im NO expert but to me misting for 5 minutes 3 x's a day seems too much, that much humidty can cause resp infection thus the mucus. Do you have a drain for the water to drain out of the cage with?? Also yes that seems about 3 x's too much stuff for the little guy. All that stuff gives crickets a TON of space to hide, and makes it a LOT harder for him to find them. Simple is easy. I too got 1 from bruce, he has a ficus, a few branches and thats it, easy to clean and easy to monitor exactly how much he is eating. Also count the crickets before you put them in there, if you count 10 in, when u get home from work count them, less than 10 eating, 10, not. Good Luck

That water regiment is wonderful. I do agree though that the cage has to dry out between mistings. So if there is no drainage you could be asking for trouble,.

 

[romulan]

Everybody, thank you for all the advice. I removed a lot of the artificial stuff that the crickets used to post in and will save it for his adult cage - doesn't look like a rain forest now. I also took the better sized crickets out and released them..I didn't want to break their little legs lol. He was curling up for bed while I was doing this so I will observe him tomorrow. I feel a lot better though, and did see a healthier, fresh poop tonight on a leaf.

 

[ataraxia]

Be sure to take all the crickets out every night,

 

[jojothefirst]

I had the same issue with my female panther recently.

It can take a few weeks to settle in. She was very active and seemed fine but only ate 2-4 crix a day...... nowhere near enough.
I had her in a 1.5ft square by 3ft tall viv so I down sized to a 1ft square by 1.5ft tall viv which was well planted and that made a big difference.

She is now back in the original viv and doing great.

I suggest you do the same.

 

[romulan]

UPDATE: Thanks everyone for all the advice. Dexter (what I named him) has been thriving! ..Eating drinking and pooping every day

The biggest change I made was removing the hibiscus and a few of the fake plants. I'll save those for his adult setup. As you can see the cage is a lot more bare now, it does not look like a dense rain forest anymore. This really helps Dex hunt. His appetite has gone way up. in short, THE SIMPLER, THE BETTER.

Since I removed the hibiscus my humidity levels dropped. To fix them, all I did was adjust my Mistking schedule and covered two sides of the cage with towels. This helps retain moisture, and he seems less interested about climbing on the screen now.

Can't see in this picture but his blues/red spots are starting to come in!