Possible tongue injury from stubborn hornworm

Howdyshay

Member
Hi guys
I have a 5.5 month old male panther. This morning I left him with a hornworm that was on a leaf right beside him and I thought he would grab it, well when I came back in a few min later this morning he had tried to grab it and was having a tug-of-war with it because it wrapped it's little legs into the stem of the pothos and was hanging on for dear life. I also had six or seven pretty good size crickets in there. When I came home this evening All of his crickets were still there there was half of a hornworm hanging on a leaf and he was down in the bottom part of his cage on a branch. I'm worried he injured his tongue on a stupid hornworm. What can I do?
 
Can you post some photos please? Is his tongue inside his mouth currently? Try and see if he can launch his tongue.
 
Tongue is inside mouth. No obvious injury. He won’t try to eat anything. He’s in the back of
his enclosure settling in for the night. He’s just been eating great no problems and not there’s half of a hornworm hanging off the pothos and he hasn’t eaten anything. I can’t really get a pic. There’s nothing really to see. I put a super in to try to get him to eat and he wouldn’t.
 
Tongue is inside mouth. No obvious injury. He won’t try to eat anything. He’s in the back of
his enclosure settling in for the night. He’s just been eating great no problems and not there’s half of a hornworm hanging off the pothos and he hasn’t eaten anything. I can’t really get a pic. There’s nothing really to see. I put a super in to try to get him to eat and he wouldn’t.
There is a possibility that hornworms can bite chameleons. How big was this worm?
 
It is very possible that he strained his tongue. The fact that it was not hanging out and he was able to retract it is a very good thing. But this is why you really only want to hand feed hornworms. His tongue may be sore for a few days... He may not take any feeders or he may go right after them tomorrow. Some will shy away from hornworms after having a bad experience.

So you want to watch to see if he can aim shoot and retract his tongue normally in the coming days.
 
It is very possible that he strained his tongue. The fact that it was not hanging out and he was able to retract it is a very good thing. But this is why you really only want to hand feed hornworms. His tongue may be sore for a few days... He may not take any feeders or he may go right after them tomorrow. Some will shy away from hornworms after having a bad experience.

So you want to watch to see if he can aim shoot and retract his tongue normally in the coming days.
Thanks so much. I was thinking that actually. I’ll see how he acts tomorrow.
 
Update! Kharma is doing much better. Eating and grabbing crickets with his tongue. Hornworms in cups only from now on. Thank you all for the input. Very happy he’s ok. ❤️❤️
 
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