Preparing for New Chameleon - How does it look!?!?

CrazyChamLady13

CrazyChamLady13

New Member
So, today I've been looking at all of my chameleon stuff from my last chameleons. Estimated how much food he will eat (willing to offer more if he's still hungry). I put a fall schedule together. My son is going to school for the first time this year, so a schedule is really important. I've also put together a list of stuff I have and stuff I need, if anyone wants to go though there and correct me. I'd very much appreciate it.

First off the schedule. Now he'll be approximately 6months old when he gets here. He is a veiled and yes I'm very much aware of their personality. Anyways:

Fall Schedule:
7am - Lights on, let him wake up and warm up.
7:30am - Time for morning sun. Goes into a 18"x18"x38" w/ hibiscus. Morning misting 2-3 in.
-8am- Breakfast time for my son
10:15 am -Preparing Chameleons breakfast
10:30 am - Bring him in, feed him 15-20 feeders. Mist 2-3 min.
-10:50am- Get my son on the bus
1:30pm - Afternoon misting 2-3 min. Free range time with a treat
-2:45pm- Get him back in his enclosure. Go pick up my son from the bus.
3:15pm - Free Range Time - Possible snack time for cham and my son
4:30pm - Afternoon mist 2-3 min
-5pm- Dinner time (Humans)
5:30pm - Outdoor Time for Everyone
7:30pm - Cham goes inside, get ready for bed.
8pm - Bed time, lights out for cham and my son.

Food 20/day
Roaches 8
Crickets 6
Silkies 6
Lightly dusted with Calcium w/o D3
Lightly dusted with Calcium w/ D3 1st and 3rd Saturday
Lightly dusted with Herptivite 2nd and 4th Saturday
 
Supplies

Things I have:
24"x30"x50" Custom enclosure
18" Duel Canopy Fixture w/ 2 5.0 uvb bulbs
40w and 60w House Bulbs
Basking Lamp
3 Umbrella Trees, 3 Ficus, pothos, and Croton
2Hand spray bottles
Roach Colony
Raphasy 3in1
Vines

Things I Need:
24"x30"x24" Base
24" Arcadia T5 w/ 6500
Mist King
Another pothos and hibiscus
Bug Burger or make my own gutload
Zoomed Reptile Calcium w/ D3 and w/o D3
And RepCal Herptivite
 
I estimated that he'll be eating approximately 500-600 feeders (roaches, crickets, and silkies a month). So since I do have my Roach colony, even though I'll need to buy some more. Ill need to buy approximately 200 crickets, and 200 silkies to last me a month at a time. Correct me if I'm wrong.

And I know that it will take him some time to get use to us, so I wont push the schedule.

Please let me know what I need to improve on or what not.
Thank you for looking!
 
I'm on my phone and really can't type well, so I'm "bookmarking" this for tomorrow. I'll weigh in if no one else has by then :)
 
off hand:

Id say thats a lot of social time, and might stress him out, especially with the first couple of months as he's acclimating to the hustle and bustle in your house

some people will get pissy about the croton plant, especially w/ a veiled as they tend to eat plants more frequently than other species. Its in the Euphorbia family and the milky white sap is a powerful irritant. In general, if a plant has a milky white sap its probably not safe... the sap of ficus is actually also toxic, though much less so, and I guess people make an exception for it

thats a lot of feeders, and I dont think your 6mo will be able to eat that many silkies before they get too big for him. The roaches will also outgrow him (assuming youre getting dubia and not something like banana roaches), You might want to consider multiple smaller orders a mo, if he actually eats that many, just to prevent them outgrowing your cham (unless you want to start your own colonies!)

I dont know if this is a personality thing or what, but your chameleon might choose its own bedtime :p maybe I just have a lazy cham, but hes generally tucking himself away on a vine or in a plant after about 10hrs

your dusting and misting schedule look good! He should get plenty of hydration between that and the silks, but if not you can always consider a dripper.

hope I didnt come across as too critical, those are just the points that caught my eye
 
If you do get the Mist King make sure you add a reservoir to your to buy list. If you want the reservoir with the misting system you can go with Aquazamp :D
 
Woa... You are on your game n00b. Seriously prepared and thorough. Only thing I would change is the UVB, I dislike bulbs because of some eye issues that chams may develop. I think you mean strips though because you mentioned it being 18". You may not need a calcium with D3, because the herp-vitamin usually has enough D3. I use Croton in my tank, my Veiled never eats it. I agree with the other poster, seems like too much food for a 6 month cham. Dont bug out though. Hehe, you will adjust better when the cham actually get there.

Its hard to milk a cow before the calf is born.

Its something my buddy used to tell me when I would get all worked up over some impending awesomeness. Basically, its hard to calculate exactly how smoothly everything will run until you are actually running everything.
 
Ok... I can cut his social time out. His big enclosure will have wheels to make it easy to move around. I plan to make a free range table soon.

Should his food be reduced to 10-15? I was told that he's a little pig so to speak, so guess we'll see. My last veiled was a very picky eater.

The croton... well its not growing so I'll leave it out. I have a bushy ficus so I'll put that one in and leave the other 2 out for free range. I can aways pick up another umbrella tree.
 
You don't necessarily need to cut out his social time, you'll just have to adjust depending on his temperament. Probably the first few days he'll be a little shy and uncomfortable and I wouldn't mess with him very much. But after that you can start easing into this schedule if he seems receptive to it and adjust as needed.

10 feeders daily might be more appropriate, perhaps even fewer depending on the size of the feeders. 5 big, medium roaches are going to be a better meal than 15 small crickets, for example. The size of the feeders will depend on him - you want the bugs to be no wider than the space between the chameleon's eyes, but they can be longer.

Overall everything looks very good! You're doing a great job preparing.
 
Thank you all for the advice... I prefer to let him get natural light butwhere we live, I'm afraid that the cats will find him an easy target. Maybe when we move he might be able to stay outside.

Ill keep you all updated on the enclosure status and everything
 
Enclosure

So this morning I was looking at my enclosure and was doing some brainstorming in my head. And this is what I came up with:

I really like the ideal of letting my cham have access to his free range when I'm home. So I was thinking about putting 2 side doors on it. If I do this, it will give me a 12in clearance to put in a nice size piece of plywood in that space to put in a wall planter and plant a couple of pothos in them. This will be done of both sides and a big door on the front!

I'm also looking into making a nice background but that may come later. I have so many weird ideals!

Thanks for reading.
 
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