Rate My Chameleon Enclosure

Hi, I’m 12 and i just got an chameleon about 2 hours ago. I was wondering if you guys could rate my cage a 1-5 with 1 being non-proficient and 5 being the opposite. Thanks!

ps; i understand the water bowls were a waste of money 😂
Remove the water bowls immediately they can grow bacteria that is not good at all for your chameleon what lights do you have? You need to raise your enclosure off of the ground your chameleon can and will get extremely stressed you need more real branches and you need to replace all of your fake plants with real plants.
 
Welcome to the forum, Rover.
Thank you, But i’ve been in a house with chameleon since i was 2, So my parents know quite a lot themselves.
With all due respect, AFAIK, no-one here knows your parents and/or what they do or don't know.
I'm sure that they know a lot 👨‍🎓👩‍🎓, but there are literally pages of posts from newcomers who say, "I've done tons of research!" only to find through discussion (asking questions) that they do not know many very basic things.

To put it another way, folks here don't know what you or your parents do or don't know. :unsure:

Nobody knows it all—even those that have been breeding chameleons for 30+ years.
The reason we're all here is to learn from each other, including new ideas & techniques that may not have been around 10 years ago. You asked for opinions (help?) and folks here are more than willing to share information and help all they can. So much so that sometimes it can be overwhelming, and seem like they are overbearing. They don't mean to be; they are just very enthusiastic (as I'm sure you are) and want the best for you and for your new pet to live a long & happy life. :)

OK. There's a thread pinned to the top of the Health Clinic forum called How to ask for help that contains only one post—a questionnaire that will help introduce yourself and your new pet to the group, and help folks here to better help you. I would say most newcomers here have filled one out. It's very simple; just copy/paste the questionnaire into a post, and edit in your answers. (It helps if you use a different color or other way to make your answers stand out from the questions.

For example: (I'm just making up answers)


Chameleon Info:
  • Your Chameleon - The species, sex, and age of your chameleon. How long has it been in your care? Veiled(?), male, unknown, 2 hours.
  • Handling - How often do you handle your chameleon? Only when absolutely necessary.
etc.
 
Hi and welcome! Rather than give you any sort of rating or score, I’d much rather say that you need to make some improvements and many others and I would be more than happy to help. :) Could you post a pic of your lights and your entire enclosure, plus some of your chameleon?
She’s a juvenile female. I use 5.0 UVB Lights, And the 100 watt zoomed basking.
 

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Hey and welcome to the world of chameleons! +1 what missskitles said. So you will need all live plants for your enclosure. Here’s a few questions. How are you misting? How are you measuring temps and humidity? What are you feeding him/her and what are you supplementing with? One last thing what are u gutloading with?
I don’t think it’s required to have life plants even if it’s best for humidity. I’m misting with a bottle, I’m measuring temps with a thermometer and hygrometer. I’m feeding her crickets but i did just get her yesterday. I’m supplementing with repticalcium without d3 and once we get more into the month i’ll be using repticalcium with d3 twice a month and reptivite twice a month.
 
Welcome to the forum, Rover.

With all due respect, AFAIK, no-one here knows your parents and/or what they do or don't know.
I'm sure that they know a lot 👨‍🎓👩‍🎓, but there are literally pages of posts from newcomers who say, "I've done tons of research!" only to find through discussion (asking questions) that they do not know many very basic things.

To put it another way, folks here don't know what you or your parents do or don't know. :unsure:

Nobody knows it all—even those that have been breeding chameleons for 30+ years.
The reason we're all here is to learn from each other, including new ideas & techniques that may not have been around 10 years ago. You asked for opinions (help?) and folks here are more than willing to share information and help all they can. So much so that sometimes it can be overwhelming, and seem like they are overbearing. They don't mean to be; they are just very enthusiastic (as I'm sure you are) and want the best for you and for your new pet to live a long & happy life. :)

OK. There's a thread pinned to the top of the Health Clinic forum called How to ask for help that contains only one post—a questionnaire that will help introduce yourself and your new pet to the group, and help folks here to better help you. I would say most newcomers here have filled one out. It's very simple; just copy/paste the questionnaire into a post, and edit in your answers. (It helps if you use a different color or other way to make your answers stand out from the questions.

For example: (I'm just making up answers)


Chameleon Info:
  • Your Chameleon - The species, sex, and age of your chameleon. How long has it been in your care? Veiled(?), male, unknown, 2 hours.
  • Handling - How often do you handle your chameleon? Only when absolutely necessary.
etc.
Thanks.
 
Welcome to the forum, Rover.

With all due respect, AFAIK, no-one here knows your parents and/or what they do or don't know.
I'm sure that they know a lot 👨‍🎓👩‍🎓, but there are literally pages of posts from newcomers who say, "I've done tons of research!" only to find through discussion (asking questions) that they do not know many very basic things.

To put it another way, folks here don't know what you or your parents do or don't know. :unsure:

Nobody knows it all—even those that have been breeding chameleons for 30+ years.
The reason we're all here is to learn from each other, including new ideas & techniques that may not have been around 10 years ago. You asked for opinions (help?) and folks here are more than willing to share information and help all they can. So much so that sometimes it can be overwhelming, and seem like they are overbearing. They don't mean to be; they are just very enthusiastic (as I'm sure you are) and want the best for you and for your new pet to live a long & happy life. :)

OK. There's a thread pinned to the top of the Health Clinic forum called How to ask for help that contains only one post—a questionnaire that will help introduce yourself and your new pet to the group, and help folks here to better help you. I would say most newcomers here have filled one out. It's very simple; just copy/paste the questionnaire into a post, and edit in your answers. (It helps if you use a different color or other way to make your answers stand out from the questions.

For example: (I'm just making up answers)


Chameleon Info:
  • Your Chameleon - The species, sex, and age of your chameleon. How long has it been in your care? Veiled(?), male, unknown, 2 hours.
  • Handling - How often do you handle your chameleon? Only when absolutely necessary.
etc.
Remove the water bowls immediately they can grow bacteria that is not good at all for your chameleon what lights do you have? You need to raise your enclosure off of the ground your chameleon can and will get extremely stressed you need more real branches and you need to replace all of your fake plants with real plants.
Okay, I’ll remove the water bowls. I have zoomed 5.0 UVB and 100 watt zoomed basking. Thanks for the raising off ground recommendation i went and bought a little table about 30 mins ago! It’s not required to have real plants and i can’t find any!
 
Remove the water bowls immediately they can grow bacteria that is not good at all for your chameleon what lights do you have? You need to raise your enclosure off of the ground your chameleon can and will get extremely stressed you need more real branches and you need to replace all of your fake plants with real plants.
Yeah just if you remove the bowls get something bigger that’ll catch the dripper water
 
Thanks for all the suggestions everyone! Im just really worried because my chameleon has a really light green color. Is it because she’s a juvenile? Is she sick? Is she scared, Because i did get her less than 24 hours ago!
 
Okay, I’ll remove the water bowls. I have zoomed 5.0 UVB and 100 watt zoomed basking. Thanks for the raising off ground recommendation i went and bought a little table about 30 mins ago! It’s not required to have real plants and i can’t find any!
You might want a 60 Watt bulb a 100 is too hot. Put your hand under the screen as close as you can to the bulb. Can your hand stay there?
 
I don’t think it’s required to have life plants even if it’s best for humidity. I’m misting with a bottle, I’m measuring temps with a thermometer and hygrometer. I’m feeding her crickets but i did just get her yesterday. I’m supplementing with repticalcium without d3 and once we get more into the month i’ll be using repticalcium with d3 twice a month and reptivite twice a month.
Sadly it is bc veiled are known to take bites of plants if they eat a fake one they will get impacted and a vet bills way more than live plants plus it won’t hurt ur cham
 
She’s a juvenile female. I use 5.0 UVB Lights, And the 100 watt zoomed basking.
Thank you for posting the pics. :)
Ok, so the screw in uvb bulbs aren’t able to provide adequate uvb levels any farther away than about 2-3”. The standard for uvb is a linear T5 fixture with either a ReptiSun 5.0 or Arcadia 6% uvb bulb. With this, your cute little lady will be able to get the uvb levels she needs at 8-9” away from the lights and also in a much wider area.
Your supplements are perfect!
You do need to add many more branches or vines for her to have lots of little roads to travel on. While it is difficult to attach things to screen, there are lots of options. There’s Dragon Ledges, which IMO are well worth it as they can also handle the weight of hanging plants. https://dragonstrand.com/dragon-ledges/ Some buy or make little trellis that is then attached to the enclosure frame that branches can then be attached to.
Live plants are a must for a veiled, and especially a female. Besides just looking nicer, veileds eat at their plants. All it takes is one nibble of a fake leaf and she could get impacted, which can be fatal if untreated. Females really eat their plants and have been known to strip all the leaves off. One of my girls ate just about every leaf off her hibiscus, although usually it’s just nibbles on all other plants. The plants also need to be safe for them to eat. Pothos and philodendron are probably the most popular and easiest. I would suggest getting a tall plant for the center of your enclosure and then add a few smaller vining plants. Attaching the safe plant list. For most plants, you will need some sort of plant light. As long as you aren’t getting a plant with high light needs like hibiscus, something like this would work well. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07BRKG7X1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I’m also attaching feeder and gutloading graphics. Both are pretty self explanatory. Like us, chameleons like variety. Your feeder bugs need to be as healthy as possible in order to provide good nutrition for your chameleon.
954319DE-AA6D-4F29-95C2-89F3EAAAB4B5.jpeg DE5F9E4A-9FDC-4C27-B8A1-D4AAEB05FFA4.jpeg 04A32AA0-B906-4B96-A786-3AF6229B85CB.jpeg 9A692018-BCD5-481F-AA92-733716424255.jpeg
 
Thank you for posting the pics. :)
Ok, so the screw in uvb bulbs aren’t able to provide adequate uvb levels any farther away than about 2-3”. The standard for uvb is a linear T5 fixture with either a ReptiSun 5.0 or Arcadia 6% uvb bulb. With this, your cute little lady will be able to get the uvb levels she needs at 8-9” away from the lights and also in a much wider area.
Your supplements are perfect!
You do need to add many more branches or vines for her to have lots of little roads to travel on. While it is difficult to attach things to screen, there are lots of options. There’s Dragon Ledges, which IMO are well worth it as they can also handle the weight of hanging plants. https://dragonstrand.com/dragon-ledges/ Some buy or make little trellis that is then attached to the enclosure frame that branches can then be attached to.
Live plants are a must for a veiled, and especially a female. Besides just looking nicer, veileds eat at their plants. All it takes is one nibble of a fake leaf and she could get impacted, which can be fatal if untreated. Females really eat their plants and have been known to strip all the leaves off. One of my girls ate just about every leaf off her hibiscus, although usually it’s just nibbles on all other plants. The plants also need to be safe for them to eat. Pothos and philodendron are probably the most popular and easiest. I would suggest getting a tall plant for the center of your enclosure and then add a few smaller vining plants. Attaching the safe plant list. For most plants, you will need some sort of plant light. As long as you aren’t getting a plant with high light needs like hibiscus, something like this would work well. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07BRKG7X1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I’m also attaching feeder and gutloading graphics. Both are pretty self explanatory. Like us, chameleons like variety. Your feeder bugs need to be as healthy as possible in order to provide good nutrition for your chameleon.
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Thank you so much! Oh my, That’s so much great information. Where can i find these plants? I’m looking and i don’t see any besides shipping and i don’t really wanna do shipping.
 
Now I want to give you a bit of info about eggs. Whether she ever even sees a male, your little sweetheart will eventually lay (infertile) eggs. This can happen when she’s as young as 6 months or so. First she’ll start by showing all of her pretty colors and patterns and she’ll be restless, constantly moving all thru her enclosure. This is her first receptive period when she is ready to mate. It lasts anywhere from a week to a few weeks. She’ll still have her pretty colors, but after her activity has slowed down, anywhere from a few weeks on she may be ready to lay eggs. We don’t always have signs that she’s ready, so it’s best to get your lay bin prepared and put in her enclosure once she’s started showing her receptive colors. You’ll need a bin that is at least 12” wide and long and will fill it to about 6” with washed play sand. The sand needs to be kept moist enough so that it can hold a tunnel without collapsing. Of course she’ll need at least a couple of stable ways to get in/out of the bin. When she needs it, she’ll find it and use it. Once she starts digging, she’ll need total privacy. I cover just the visible areas with a light sheet that I’ve made little holes in so I can sneak peeks. The whole process takes 1-2 days and you’ll keep your same light schedule. She may sleep in her tunnel at night. When she’s done, she’ll be basking and looking much thinner. You’ll want to feed her very well for 2-3 days and then cut her feedings back to 3-4 feeders 3 days a week (plus occasional treats) and make sure her basking temp doesn’t go over 80. This will help reduce her egg production and laying, which will lengthen her life span.
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