sick cham :-( advise greatly needed

[Dawn555125]

as for the diet advise i am having issues, my local pet stores do not carry these bugs other than the roaches and i am sorry but there is no chance in a million yrs i would bring a roach of any kind into my house for any reason.

i will look at different pet stores near my area to ask about these other bugs.
my usual store did have hornworms but wanted $15 each and would have to order at least 10at a time. Im pritty sure this is over priced (or at least hoping).

all my lizard know how comes from bearded dragons, monitors, and geckos. (not tropic)

I greatly do not like the word MBD, i lost my young tegu to mbd this spring. She was a loving little girl and had an amazing personality. I had her only 4months after i got her from a breeder only to realize she was not growing. I took her to the vet to learn she had mbd and should never had been sold to me because hers was from a defect in her liver that the breeder should have been told of by their vet. i strongly hope this is not the case with stevie because i dont wish to go through that again.

 

[Dawn555125]

i added two pictures of him from today to the album and dated them.

 

[sandrachameleon]

romain lettus is about 60% of my turtles diet

try not to rely on romaine that heavily. It is okay, but not ideal for turtles nor chameleons.

You might have to source feeder prey online if your local shops are inadequate.
lots of online choices: https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/sandrachameleon/171-where-buy-feeders-online.html

hornworms are usually around a half dollar to a dollar each - certainly not $15 each.

You might reconsider the roaches - the tropical roaches we use as feeder prey are not the same as the ones that people think about as being in their homes - they are not the infesting type. Even if you find that difficult to believe, Perhaps ask the pet shop to sell you a single Male cockroach - you should have no concerns about a male roach right?

 

[PoshPenny]

The dubias are not that bad and this is coming from a girl who hates roaches too but I love my Cham. The babies look like Rollie pollies. They are live breeders which means a regenerating food source, you might not like them but your wallet will. I keep them in my garage in a big plastic bin from walmart. They don't really scurry like house roaches. Honesty the crickets are more of a pain then them. Have you gave her fruit yet? A chopped up strawberry?? A raspberry? Mustard greens and collard greens are hit with my Cham but in moderation. I use a spring mix but pick out the spinach since it can effect calcium absorption and I use it occasionally in my gutloading. I've been using oranges for my crickets for watering and man do they plump up, Frita ate one this morning and it burst in her mouth all juicy and plump. Amazing how quick 4000 crickets can eat a orange too.

 

[Lathis]

i will look at different pet stores near my area to ask about these other bugs.
my usual store did have hornworms but wanted $15 each and would have to order at least 10at a time. Im pritty sure this is over priced (or at least hoping).

$15 per pod or per worm???

You can definitely order hornworms and silkworms online. I do it all the time (so does everyone else here ) Coastal Silkworms and Mulberry Farms are both forum sponsors that I have ordered from. A little pricey with shipping, but with time, my cham has come to LOVE silkworms.

 

[ridgebax1]

Definately order horns and silks. I actually followed the instructions on Pigglett79's blog about raising silkworms and successfully got eggs. The moths are actually very neat looking. They don't fly or eat just have sex and make eggs! I found a source on ebay for silkworm chow that was much less expensive than other sites too and it was not hard to make. I am going to try hornworms this summer too. I have several hornworm pupa that I am keeping in my laundry room. It is a natural light cycle and on the cool side.
Keeping roaches is not bad at all. I have them in a bin in my house. They don't stink, make noise or anything like that. They cant jump, fly or crawl up the sides of the bin. The biggest problem I am having with them is keeping their water crystals wet because they need to be kept hot in order to breed and I have a ceramic heat emitter over the bin and they sit near a floor vent so I am not having a problem with babies either; getting tons of those. I have Dubia and Turkistans. The dubias do look like roly poly bugs when they are babies. The biggest problem I have with them is that Omar is not very interested as they aren't as active in the feeder bowl as crickets but my beardie loves them. I haven't fed off any of the turks yet as I am trying to build a colony. I have lots of egg cases and definately have more than when I started so I am going to try them soon.
Also in looking at his enclosure, I think you need to add more in the way of plants. I got several nice pothos at Home Depot so maybe that would help him feel more secure. I have a combination of live and fake plants in Omar and Clouseau's cage. I use the fake plants to fill in when the live ones look a little beat up. If you have a craft store such as Michaels or Pat Catans they have fake plants for a more reasonable price than the pet stores. I got several 6ft long vine type fake plants at Pat Catan's for about $6 each. I have them hanging in the corners of Omar's cage and around the ficus cause it has been very sad since I transplanted it (they hate to be disturbed). It is finally getting some new growth on it.

 

[Dawn555125]

i gave him some of my turtles salad last night (romain lettus, small bits of apple, carrot shhreds that he did not eat, and i picked the grapes out cause i was afraid he might choke in them.) he ate a small handfull and had a nice plump belly after.

i also gave the crickets some lettus and apple with their gut load and will feed them to him tonight. and the lights off thing has helped with morning stress i think so i will deffently keep the lights out at night now.

i will deffently check out some online sourses for horn/silk worms. It would just be plain cool to watch him chow down on a big ol' hornworm.

I was told that he is a male because he has very obviouse spurs on his hind feet.

its been a long time since ive tried raising feeders, i was going through over 200 crickets alone per week at the time and then was buying worms (i had 6 frogs, 2newts, a beardie, and a monitor at the time so you could imagain the bug costs) most of my amphibian/reptiles came from the humain sosiety so we would get an inteeresting mix at times.
ihave a pothos but then was told that if he eats it it can cause blisters and burns in his mouth so it became a kitchen plant, im going to have to get a new ficus cause he pulled the last leaf off it last night...

 

[kplatvoet]

If you can give him crickets earlier in the day instead of at night- I found it helps a lot with mine - it gives them a chance to digest and they sleep better and wake up with more energy

 

[sandrachameleon]

...ihave a pothos but then was told that if he eats it it can cause blisters and burns in his mouth so it became a kitchen plant, im going to have to get a new ficus cause he pulled the last leaf off it last night...

ficus sap is more likely to cause mouth, eye and skin irritation than pothos

 

[Dawn555125]

ok this is probably a stupid question but how many crickets should a cham eat in one sitting. or even how much food should they eat in one day...

With all your advise on new diet and food options (lettus fruit new bugs etc...) stevie has once again became very interested in his food... maybe a lil too interested. today he has eaten a small salad (like fit in the palm of my hand small) and he just ate 25 crickets and i took away the container after seeing how many he ate in less than 5 min.

i want to put his weight back on him but i also know over feeding can cause problems. and i know if his appitite goes back to what it was then adding more tasty food options is going to end up a feeding frenzy if i aint careful.

also i looked over the lables and im using flukers dry gutload and also flukers calcium with vitamin d3, phosphorus free powder. 36% calcium and 100,000 IU/pound D3.

 

[Mijah139]

You can really give the chameleon as much as he will eat while he is still growing. Having not eaten insects for a while, i imagine that he is quite hungry

For gutload, many advise using a dry gutload AND a wet gutload. Cricket crack is a common dry, and repashy is a good wet gutload. Add in some fruits and veggies and you'll be set.

Check out the site sponsors (you can find links to all of their sites in the classified section), many of them offer a wider selection of feeders than your local store will and at much cheaper prices.

 

[Jordyt]

Care sheet

No trying to be rude but if you don't know what D3 is you should read the care sheet for veileds. It is under care resources in the top left corner. Very useful info.

 

[ridgebax1]

You should only be using the calcium with D3 twice a month, the rest of the time use plain calcium. How many crickets to feed depends on age as well as the size of the cricket. The recommendation for young chameleons is to allow them to eat as many appropriate sized feeders as they can within five minutes. Clouseau will eat 25-30 1/4 inch crickets every time I offer them. On days when he gets horns or silks he will eat 4-6 inch or so long worms. Phoenix worms about a dozen small to mediums. On the days he gets worm I still throw in some crix later in the day.