Welcome to the forum, we've all had our different experiences with caring for our chameleons; but, what matters most is that you care about them enough to reach out and ask questions!
- Your Chameleon - 1 year old male veiled chameleon named Ollie and he’s been in my care since January of 2025
Can we see a picture of Ollie? You can't just tease us with all this information on him and not include a picture of him!
- Handling - I handle my chameleon everyday for at least a few minutes before work. Am changing their (have two but filling out a separate one for her) schedules to be able to interact with them more
Please do let us know about the female too!
Here's a good read about gaining trust with your chameleons.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/building-trust-with-your-chameleon.2396/
If you're not aware females lay eggs, even without mating. Here's a good one on female care.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/veiled-chameleon-laying-101.2488/
- Feeding - I am feeding 8 L crickets, 2-4 M-L Dubia roaches, and 2 super worms… I occasionally feed hornworms. crickets often die to fast (trying to find a solution) so then I feed them 6-8 dubia roaches and 2-4 super worms until I can get more crickets. I feed them everyday around 2-2:30pm.
If your male is one you can reduce the feeding to once every other day.
Your female should be fed less at around 6 months to help reduce egg production as mentioned in the link above.
- Supplements - I use cricket gutload powder from petsmart. I supplement with zoo med calcium powder without d3 everyday, and zoo med reptivite vitamin with d3 every 1 1/2-2 weeks am looking for better products.
now that he’s one years old I will dial it back to 3 days a week
It's best to feed crickets and feeder bugs fresh produce. Like this:
View attachment 368714
For the D/multi vitamins I use this:
View attachment 368715
- Watering - I had a mist king mister for awhile then I broke the controller
. So now I mist about 4-5 minutes a day once before lights come on, and after I get home from work. I do a light 2 minutes misting before I go to work, I also use a reptisafe water conditioner. I see Ollie drinking everyday, he will often come up to me while I’m spraying or just sit there drinking it up so I spray him lightly on his face and he seems to enjoy that haha..
You might be able to get a replacement controller on eBay. I personally use
this for a misting system. Unless you have well water or very poor tap water you don't need reptisafe water conditioner. Although it is recommended to use reverse osmosis water with the misting system.
- Fecal Description - His poop and pupate look good, white with some orange or yellow. Pupate used to be all white with the mist king, but I heard that was not good for it to be all white, so I lowered my watering a tad bit, just a tad bit… he drops I wanna say once a day, once every other day, to once every 3 days. I’ve only actively seen him poop three times since my husbandry, but it’s kinda funny to see. I have not tested for parasite or have taken to the vet. I know… im sorry… i feel bad about it too… I will be taking him to the vet consistently since I’m stable now…
This sounds normal.
- History - He’s active/chill, has a bold personality, loves being handled unlike my female . Tbh don’t know what this history bit wanted.
Perfect!
Cage Info:
- Cage Type -
- Cage is currently too small and I hate it… imma upgrade him to a 2x2x4 hybrid bioactive setup. Got him when I just started getting my life back together and wasn’t as researched, so I bought what I could. It’s the reptibreeze chameleon screen enclose, the small one with the bright red panther chameleon on the cover (not even the xl 2x2x4) as they only had that smaller one
Dimensions are 16 x 16 x 30 january 2025 to April 28 2026)
New enclosure dimensions for 2 years will be 2 x 2 x4 & bioactive (1-3 years old) when I got him
Then will upgrade him to a 4 x 2 x 4 when hes (3-5 years old)
I would make getting him (them) a bigger cage a priority, if possible.
- Lighting -
- I use a heat lamp, with a 75w heat bulb, I use a reptisun uvb light bar with t5 bulb, I use Arcadia jungle dawn light for my plants, Light schedule was 7-7. They are Currently at 9-9, but have been slowly changing it to 2pm to 2am.
Are they in a dark room so that any window/outside light doesn't disturb them before their cage lights turn on between 2pm-2am? Mine are very sensitive and know when the seasons and light change. So, I'm just imagining that if it wasn't dark between 6am-2pm, it might throw them off their circadian rhythm.
- Temperature -
- Temp is usually around the 92 basking, 75 ambient and a nightly 63-65, I measure using a Hygrometer and thermometer.
92 sounds a bit high for basking, it's usually around 83-85.
- Humidity - Humidity has been harder to keep for me but it’s stays around a 35%-45% with the screen cage and at night is a little higher at 55%-65%. Misting, humidity soil, reptibreeze fogger (getting a different one)
Does the humidity soil have biological bugs to eat any bacteria in the bottom to make it bioactive?
- Plants - I am using live plants, pothos and zz plant (zz plant going away soon as space is limited and found out it doesn’t like the moisture). Space is also limited due to enclosure size and something I built that I maybe don’t like in there, So I can’t wait to swap out enclosures…
Your cage looks full enough for the size in the picture.
- Placement -
- Enclosure is Located on a 4 x 2 x 4 stand cabinet, No fans, a window that stays closed, and it’s a light-medium traffic area(my bedroom)
Height is probably around 5 feet 5-7 inches off the ground from top of enclosure to bottom of cabinet
Perfect, can the male see the female when they're in their cages?
- Location - I am located in Sparks, Nv
- I also have a female Cham, should I make one for her as well? She’s different than Ollie is
Yes please and pictures of your little loves.
- My current problem is pretty much everything as a whole. I feel like I’m doing good enough and I’m not a great husbander to my chams. I want to know if that feeling goes away or if there’s something I can do better and hopefully it’s something I can do better. I just want as much information as possible.
Are they happy, idk
are they living, yes
Can I do better, yes
Am I open to criticism, help, and information, yes
- Can’t upload photos for some reason, I got it had to refresh. The two pothos plants are out because I’m changing his enclosure around. I don’t like the thing I build, might take it down and do the branches instead of what I did
You're on the right track my friend, we always have little worries that we may not be doing our best. But when you acknowledge what needs to be better, it sets you on the right track to success; and eventually you'll get everything to the point where there's less worries.
If you need any help or advice your in good hands with this forum.
no worries my friend, we can try and work out things with our imagination.
