Rescued a Panther Chameleon made a custom cage. Advice welcomed

[KrinsCham]

I grew up taking care of many reptiles so I do have a little experience. Much more than the person who found this guy and put him in a aquarium, so I convinced him to let me rescue him.
So far I have taken a large parrot cage, lined it with screen to contain crickets and put a large Hibiscus and a Gardena plant along with many cleaned manzanita branches. My wife did not like the "ugly screen cages" so even though I have not seen anyone doing this simple yet time consuming bird cage modification, it seemed like a great idea to me. So far it has worked well, it even comes with bowls that swing out that I can put his food in (this morning he was waiting for me to put food in the bowl). I lowered the floor to gain an extra 6 inches of vertical space. Over all living space is 35 1/2"Wx 27"Dx 52"H @highest point. Temperature has been about 8 degrees variation from top of cage to the bottom, not including basking spot. Parrot cages have easy clean pull out tray on the bottom that I have lined with cardboard and placed small water collection trays under the plants (plan on keeping dry).
Lighting is a 60 watt daylight blue for basking, and a 24" HO T5 currently running two 6400K 24watt bulbs. A replacement T5 Reptisun UVB 10.0 is on the way, which I plan to run next to one 6400K bulb both 24watts. I also ordered a Deep dome combo that I plan on running a reptisun 5.0 HO UVB 13 watt bulb and a repti-glo full spectrum 26watt bulb. The basking light will remain the same 60watt blue daylight. I plan on playing around with thermostats to control the basking spot temperature and a ceramic heater as a just in case temps drop to low.
Water, I have a dripper on a very slow drip and I mist the tank 2x daily (not him directly).
Food; so far he has eaten about 5-9 bugs a day, crickets and superworms.

I think I have done pretty good so far but if you see any places I can improve upon please let me know. My only burning question is how much UVB light, is there such thing as to much, in terms of how many watts and how many hours a day. Currently planning on running 12 hour days with 37 watts 1xCF13w UVB and 1T5 13wUVB, might up the CF to a higher wattage if it will be helpful. I could also double the T5's but if I don't need to I would like to run one grow light for the plants and to mix up the wavelengths.
Cheers to all look forward to sharing, and learning.
Krin

 

[jannb]

Welcome to the forums and congrats on your new Panther. I'm glad you got him and providing him with a good home. He's a good looking boy. Nice enclosuretoo! In the past I've used a bird cage for one of my panthers outside sun cage. I recommend you rethink your lights. You don't need so many. One UVB, one basking and one plant light. Are you using supplements? What are you feeding and how are you gut loading? Sorry if I missed that, it's early here. I'm attaching my blog for new keepers below. I have had success over the years with this method.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blo...-with-young-veiled-or-panther-chameleons.325/

 

[Mikesyring]

I like the Mercury all in one light uv/ uvb heat good for panthers but u need too give him different levels of basking areas they tend to get hot

 

[Mikesyring]

He looks good tho

 

[Wowbango]

I would ditch the red bulb, not necessary at all. As long as you have your UVB bulb and a basking spot. Those colored "heat bulbs" are a scam, a regular incandescent bulb will provide plenty of heat and cost you $0.99.

 

[KrinsCham]

JannB, thanks for the advice and I also appreciated your earlier post it was informative. I am currently feeding the crickets calcium enriched food. Plan on getting a multi, calcium and a D3. Just not sure if i should do D3 separate or mixed with calcium or vitamins. Also what is the dosage, how much of each is ideal or too much, do we have info on the RDA of each? Short answer yes I will provide supplements, although I found it interesting you suggested in your blog that with properly fed food and sunlight exposure you may not have to. The cage is on wheels so I will roll him out into the sun on warm days.
With the lights, I was wondering if there is any calculation/suggestion of how much wattage per area that is Ideal and in what wave length. What is Ideal for health and happiness of Chameleon and plants? I will measure temperature closely as you suggested and watch the plants. They have these type of calculations for planted fish tanks, thought maybe they had them for Chameleons.
Thanks again for the advice. Cheers!

 

[KrinsCham]

Mikesyring, I will check out the mercury all in one bulb you suggested. I have many basking branches in the cage for him to climb around on. Do you mean for the basking spot there should be different level perches? Thanks

 

[KrinsCham]

Wowbango, Red light was me just keeping his temperature steady at night for the first few nights. I wanted to keep him a little warmer because he had a little sniffle the first day I had him, probably from being outside for who knows how long. His sniffle is gone and I have not used the red light since. I also was under the impression that night time temps shouldn't drop below 70, but this was from old memory, current reading seems to suggest that 65 at night is just fine. My house doesn't get much cooler that 65 so I think I am OK at night just going to have a ceramic heater on thermostat just in case. Thanks

 

[MissLissa]

I live in Northern Canada, and our might temps drop to 62F in the winter, with no problems at all. A ceramic heater is going to dry out your enclosure like crazy. I'd avoid it if at all possible.

I use a modified bird cage too- it works great, and protects the nails from getting ripped out on the screen. I use a 36" Arcadia T5 UVB bulb, a growlight I bought at my local nursery, and a 60W incandescent bulb for heat. That's it. The basking area holds at 85F, with a gradient down to room temperature (ambient is about 75F, lowest is 72F).

The basic supplementation schedule for panther chameleons is: every feeding, dust with Calcium withOUT D3. Once every 2 weeks, dust with Calcium WITH D3, Every two weeks (alternating with the Ca/D3) dust with a multivitamin with prOformed vitamin A. I wouldn't bother with the "all in one" supplements as they are often poorly balanced for chameleons.You want to use enough "dust" to lightly coat all the feeders, but not so much they are caked in it and have a hard time moving around! It's not an exact science.

For example, my rotation is:
Week 1: Mon/Tues/Wed/Thurs/Fri/Sat is all Calcium withOUT D3, Sunday is Calcium WITH D3
Week 2: Mon/Tues/Wed/Thurs/Fri/Sat is all Calcium withOUT D3, Sunday is Multivitamin

A few enclosure tips:

• If that's a waterbowl in the first pic, there really is no need for one: chams won't usually drink standing water so it's just going to get poopy and gross really fast. A reliable dripper and a misting system is a way better option
• I'm not sure on your substrate- the pictures seem to be telling me different things. If you are using pine chips as a substrate, make sure your cham cannot get to them at all. Chameleons are notorious for eating substrate, and chips are likely to cause impaction if he does indulge. Also, I'm not sure about pine and chameleons: they tend to have a pretty sensitive respiratory system. The only "chips" I've ever used with reptiles (and never with a chameleon) were aspen, which are generally considered easier on their lungs. Both pine and aspen chips tend to be very "drying", so they may cause your humidity to drop. Even if you can keep the humidity up, they are likely to mold very quickly as pine and aspen aren't at all resistant to wet rot. The soil around the live plants should be completely covered by large rocks too big for him to fit in his mouth because they will often try to eat those too... it might actually be, but I can't tell from the photos
• He would likely appreciate some more foliage to screen his basking areas: they like to feel secure when basking. The top third of the cage looks pretty bare. If you use temporary fake plants, you can remove them once your live plants start to grow and fill in. That's what I did, and it's working great.

He's lovely! I can't wait for more pictures.