New owner question

Neoshine

New Member
Last weekend I got a 1 year old female panther chameleon. I got her enclosure set up, had her lamps set up, but for my UVA/B I was using the VivTech SurSun Jungle bulb. When I was using that bulb, she would go to the top, bask just fine, explore her cage, ate just fine and was able to feed her twice.

I was worried since it's more of a spotlight that she might not be getting the needed UVB she needed, so I switched to a Reptisun T5.0 HO to try to give her more light and better coverage. I did that yesterday, and yesterday and today she's spent a lot more time much lower in her cage(reptibreeze 24x24x48), almost on the ground level near the rubber plant I have in her enclosure instead of around the middle like before. She also completely refused to eat today. I have this bulb about 8 inches from bulb to basking branch, so it shouldn't be a matter of being too close.

Is this normal? Could the reptisun just be too bright for her compared to the vivtech? I've read the issue(s) about using a more spotlight style bulb, but she seemed better with that light comparatively.

Thanks for any advice!
 
Last weekend I got a 1 year old female panther chameleon. I got her enclosure set up, had her lamps set up, but for my UVA/B I was using the VivTech SurSun Jungle bulb. When I was using that bulb, she would go to the top, bask just fine, explore her cage, ate just fine and was able to feed her twice.

I was worried since it's more of a spotlight that she might not be getting the needed UVB she needed, so I switched to a Reptisun T5.0 HO to try to give her more light and better coverage. I did that yesterday, and yesterday and today she's spent a lot more time much lower in her cage(reptibreeze 24x24x48), almost on the ground level near the rubber plant I have in her enclosure instead of around the middle like before. She also completely refused to eat today. I have this bulb about 8 inches from bulb to basking branch, so it shouldn't be a matter of being too close.

Is this normal? Could the reptisun just be too bright for her compared to the vivtech? I've read the issue(s) about using a more spotlight style bulb, but she seemed better with that light comparatively.

Thanks for any advice!
What’s the percent of uv 5.0 10.0 ?
 
Here are pictures of her cage, the area, etc. The picture of her in the Tupperware dish was when I first got her last weekend. I know the lamp needs to be a little off the cage in the event she climbs to the top, but I'm considering switching her bulb back tomorrow to the Vivtech during her lights on since she seemed to have responded better to that one.

I set up a milk jug dripper for her for later in the day that's not shown here.
 

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She's beautiful...healthy looking!
Do you have a laybin in her cage?

@Beman is better with lighting than I am...so I'm tagging her for you.

I do not have a lay bin currently in her enclosure, but I can definitely put one in if needed!

I definitely want to give Elesa the best possible care I can which is why the no eating with the 5.0 bulb versus the Vivtech has me concerned, she ate both crickets and super worms just fine on Monday and Wednesday with the Vivtech, and ate nothing today. I tried to give her some horned worms so that might be an issue cause I wanted to bring her hydration up a little.
 
I would definitely put a laybin in there....washed playsand just moist enough to hold a tunnel.

Regarding the eating, I can't tell you about the vivtech bulb...I've never used one.

What color are her urates?
 
I would definitely put a laybin in there....washed playsand just moist enough to hold a tunnel.

Regarding the eating, I can't tell you about the vivtech bulb...I've never used one.

What color are her urates?

She's only given me 1 poop and it was mostly orange, but that could be because she was at a convention all weekend.

That's why I'm trying to bring her hydration up currently to have a better feel for how she's drinking. I mist her enclosure in the morning pretty heavily and I don't at night currently because I live in Indiana, so it's starting to get a lot colder. I set up a dripper later in the day to give her more to drink.

We keep the house at 70 because we also have Tarantulas and Chinchillas, so I can't let the overall house temp drop super low.
 
Nice looking girl. Like @kinyonga and @crosscutts please put in a lay bin asap, because she looks already receptive IMHO, that peachy /salmon color is in general their receptive coloring. The not eating and sitting low could even indicate she is close for laying eggs. You also did great job setting up her enclosure, you did your homework. Could you raise the enclosure from the floor? Best the level that when she sits on her basking branch she’s above eye level, then everything would be perfect. This would give her an even more secured and controlled feeling.
 
Nice looking girl. Like @kinyonga and @crosscutts please put in a lay bin asap, because she looks already receptive IMHO, that peachy /salmon color is in general their receptive coloring. The not eating and sitting low could even indicate she is close for laying eggs. You also did great job setting up her enclosure, you did your homework. Could you raise the enclosure from the floor? Best the level that when she sits on her basking branch she’s above eye level, then everything would be perfect. This would give her an even more secured and controlled feeling.

Raising her enclosure off the floor is something I'm still working on figuring out how I want to go about it.

I'll set up a lay bin this weekend to see if that's what's going on.

The not eating part might just be me being too anxious about a new family member and wanting to provide the best care I can, since she ate fine twice this week, so it might have just been too soon as well.

I really appreciate everyone taking the time in giving advice :)
 
An Update: She ate just fine once I gave her some crickets with the 5.0 bulb still on, she might just not like horned worms yet, then went to the bottom, so later today I'm going to set up a lay bin for her.
 
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