Questions Questions Questions!

[Amanda1801]

Hiya,

I have like...300 more questions! Bit of a mixed bag, so thought I'd put it here in general rather than starting 20 new threads! There's also some photos of his x-rays down the bottom for anyone whos interested

1) - Cleaning - What should I use to clean Colin's leaves/branches etc (all fake!) - he has a habit of pooing on them! Also, how often (approx) should he be cleaned out?

2) - At the moment he is on a bark-like substrate but this is going tomorrow - what can I use to line the bottom of his viv instead? I'm figuring he needs something to get traction on the floor (he does wander about on the floor) and soak up any excess water and such.

3) - He is quite slow (or maybe its laziness!) when it comes to food - he seems to like to eat out of his food bowl, and doesn't seem to eat many of the crickets/locusts that end up all over his enclosure. At the moment I'm putting them in the fridge prior to feeding him so that they slow down, but often it takes him so long to get down from his branches, that they've warmed up again and buggered off! Whether he's slow because of his MBD and can't move as well as he should be able to I'm not sure - Is there anything else I can do to slow them down a bit? I've seen "canned" crickets/locusts etc. online and wondering if he'd be happy to eat dead ones - worth a try I guess? His food bowl has reasonably deep sides (he perches on the edge of it - so cute!) and I was wondering if there was anything else live that doesnt tend to jump about quite so much that he could eat as a staple part of his diet? He also loves little wormy things and always eats these first, which leads to my next question...

4) - He is having liquid calcium for the forseeable future to bring his calcium back up - at the moment I'm injecting this into a wax worm and giving him one a day. He loves wormy things, so they go down really well, but im aware that the wax worms aren't the most nutritious things in the world for them to eat. Someone suggested phoenix worms (not sure if these have an alternative name?) - and I found some quite interesting info on these, which I've included in the link below - how good/bad for him would these be, and could they be fed on a regular basis? http://www.exotic-pets.co.uk/phoenix-worms.html

5) - How much should I be feeding him a day? Give me a something with fur, and I'd know exactly how much! He is quite thin and underweight...I don't wanna feed him too much as I'd like him to be healthy as opposed to fat...but how do I know how much he needs?

I think that's it (for now!!) - I'll undoubtedly think of more!

Photos of x-rays:

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos...59542890_100000150017800_638449_7307303_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos...52876254_100000150017800_638445_7055391_n.jpg

This one shows the extent of his fractures (the ones that were visible from the photos I took - more visible on the actual x-ray ) it's no wonder he walks like an arthritic old man! http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos...02872069_100000150017800_638642_4903911_n.jpg

Amanda & Colin

 

[carol5208]

Thanks for posting the pics, interesting to see but I feel sorry for him and what he has had to go through. As far as the substrate, use nothing or you canuse paper towels to soak up the water. I don't use anything and as soon as I see the water pooling or collecting I wipe it out with a towel. Silkworms and hornworms are good feeders also. Wax worms fatty, and meal worms, well they don't have much meat and are pretty much all chitin(hard exoskeleton) so they can be fed but not too much. As far as the feeding, how old is your chameleon again, I forget?. As far as cleaning the branches and fake leaves and stuff, I just use a little dish soap and make sure it is rinsed well with hot water. I clean my cage everyday. As soon as I see poop or something I clean it It varies on how often you want to do a full cage cleaning where you take the whole thing apart and wash EVERYTHING. It is really up to you. You can pull the crickets legs off so they cannot jump and then they will stay in the feed cup. Something I never wanted to do. Try to not to leave them in there at night because they have been known to take a bite or two out of a sleeping chameleon! Don't waste your time on the canned ones. They only eat live prey. They like things that move!

 

[Amanda1801]

Thanks for posting the pics, interesting to see but I feel sorry for him and what he has had to go through. As far as the substrate, use nothing or you canuse paper towels to soak up the water. I don't use anything and as soon as I see the water pooling or collecting I wipe it out with a towel. Silkworms and hornworms are good feeders also. Wax worms fatty, and meal worms, well they don't have much meat and are pretty much all chitin(hard exoskeleton) so they can be fed but not too much. As far as the feeding, how old is your chameleon again, I forget?. As far as cleaning the branches and fake leaves and stuff, I just use a little dish soap and make sure it is rinsed well with hot water. I clean my cage everyday. As soon as I see poop or something I clean it It varies on how often you want to do a full cage cleaning where you take the whole thing apart and wash EVERYTHING. It is really up to you. You can pull the crickets legs off so they cannot jump and then they will stay in the feed cup. Something I never wanted to do. Try to not to leave them in there at night because they have been known to take a bite or two out of a sleeping chameleon! Don't waste your time on the canned ones. They only eat live prey. They like things that move!

Thanks for that He's 6 months old and quite thin - at the moment he is having like...one wax worm a day with his calcium stuff in it - because he's so thin I figured this wouldnt hurt until i got hold of some phoenix worms which seem to be higher in calcium, lower in fat.

I did see a vibrating food dish today which made me laugh! I'd rather not have to touch the locusts (they actually disgust me and it takes a lot!) and dont particularly want to pull their legs off! And yeah - don't worry about them being left in over night - they keep escaping from a small hole in the top mesh and getting all over my house In an ideal world there'll be a nice wormy thing out there I can feed him as a staple diet! I might try some of the small non-climbing cockroaches too, just to vary it for him a bit and see what he likes - i have a feeling hes never eaten anything but crickets before.

 

[carol5208]

My chameleon refuses to eat crickets. He has been off them for quite some time and I try to introduce them now and then to trick him into being a "new" food but he is too smart for that! I mainly use silkworms as my staple. It might be wrong(I have been told different things on here) and I feed superworms and occasionally hornworms. So he is mostly on a worm diet! Silkworms are very close in nutritional value to crickets but they are soft bodied so I try to put some chitin in his diet with the supers. I have not brought myself to keep roaches! I don't even know if he will like them, as he totally turns up his nose at crickets. Your cham is 6 months old so he should be eating proably like 8-10 med crickets a day (if he will eat them) and you can feed him some worms here and there as treats. I would much rather feed him the crickets but he won't so there is not much I can do. I am not even sure where you get the locusts here, that is something I have never tried.

 

[Amanda1801]

My chameleon refuses to eat crickets. He has been off them for quite some time and I try to introduce them now and then to trick him into being a "new" food but he is too smart for that! I mainly use silkworms as my staple. It might be wrong(I have been told different things on here) and I feed superworms and occasionally hornworms. So he is mostly on a worm diet! Silkworms are very close in nutritional value to crickets but they are soft bodied so I try to put some chitin in his diet with the supers. I have not brought myself to keep roaches! I don't even know if he will like them, as he totally turns up his nose at crickets. Your cham is 6 months old so he should be eating proably like 8-10 med crickets a day (if he will eat them) and you can feed him some worms here and there as treats. I would much rather feed him the crickets but he won't so there is not much I can do. I am not even sure where you get the locusts here, that is something I have never tried.

I think i'll look into the nutritional value of various worms for sure - he goes mad for them! as soon as he sees one he flies down his branches (he got some new ones today - infact, he got £110 of goodies today ) and is straight there to eat them - he munched on some locusts too, but really doesnt seem interested in crickets....shame i despise the damn locusts! Oh the things we do for love....!

 

[carol5208]

i hear ya on that one! Good luck with the "food" shopping!!!