Some questions for the scientists among us

[Eszzie]

I was wondering how scientists perform tests on chameleon to determ what kinds of minerals/vitamins are good and bad, and what the use is of these minerals and how much they need of it, in what way it's best to get these supplements and stuff like that.

I know about UV measurements, temperature measures and stuff, but I was wondering, is this determined by blood tests or?

Maybe some scientists on this forum can explain how they figure these things out? In normal people language pls

 

[laurie]

I am way far from a scientist but, my vet has explained it to me but I can't even start to explain it to you except to say yes it is by blood tests. For example a high level of some acid maybe uric acid indicates gout.

 

[Eszzie]

That's exactly my problem I've had several explanations from vets and scientists about several things but sometimes to difficult to be able to tell it on to other chameleon keepers. So maybe if someone can write it down how this exactly works and is tested than I can save it on my comp, translate and inform other people from my country for instance. Or if someone has articles or anything?

I'm also still looking for an article about TSD with pardalis. Emmanual van Heygen once had a converence in California where they explained TSD is possible with pardalis. Unfortunatly he didn't have anything written down from it. Only thing I know from it is that Temperature-dependant Sex Determination appears in very small temperature rates, not as big difference as for instance with leopard gecko's.

I just think these things are very interesting for the people who want to take their chameleon speciality a little higher and then it's easy to have something written down by someone so you can read it over and over
If i listen to a story i can't remember anything the next day

 

[laurie]

send a pm to Dave Weldon in case he doesn't see your post. He can explain it ti you.

 

[Chris Anderson]

Regarding TSD in chameleons, it has never been proven to exist. There are indications from some species that it could possibly exist but nothing statistically significant. It has only been statistically tested in Ch. calyptratus and in both cases they did not find statistical support for TSD. There are three articles I know of off the top of my head you can look at:

-Andrews, R. M. (2005). Incubation Temperature and Sex Ratio of the Veiled Chameleon (Chamaeleo calyptratus). J. Herpetol. 39, 515-518. (http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1670/33-05N.1)
-Long, J. (2008). The influence of incubation temperature on sex determination in the Veiled Chameleon, Chamaeleo calyptratus. Chameleons! Online E-Zine, February 2008. (http://www.chameleonnews.com/08FebLong.html)
-Spier, S. and Stegemann, T. (2005). Zur temperaturabhängigen Geschlechtsdetermination (TGD)/temperature dependent sex determination (TSD) bei Chamäleons. Chamaeleo 31, 9-14. (http://www.agchamaeleons.de/download-files/Chamaeleo_31.pdf)

As far as tests for vitamins and minerals, etc., there are many different tests depending on specifically what you are looking for. These can include histopathology, bloodwork measuring different metabolism and health indicator compounds, including the vitamins/minerals themselves, bone mineral density measurements, bone mineral concentration measurements, clinical symptoms themselves, reproductive success, lifespan, behavior, egg development and calcification, etc. All of these are indicators of performance and health and can be used to measure the effect of different treatments. An important aspect of any study, however, is that you have to have an experiment that compares a trial (a mineral/vitamin regiment, for instance) to a control (lack of that regiment or mineral/vitamin) with ample replication in order to compare trends. You then need to statistically test the significance of your findings to determine if the result is actually significant or just the result of chance.

Chris

 

[Eszzie]

Thanks so much for your reply Chris, I will have to read it over and over a bit to understand fully but that's also because the English terms are quite hard for me.
I would so love to be able to see some people bringing these tests into practice. It's hard to imagine how things are tested and developed from just reading about it, I think you have a great position on that Chris, makes me jealous sometimes

Thanks for sending the articles regarding TSD, too bad Emmanuel van Heygen didn't have any articles about it, because I found a lot of articles on calyptratus but not about pardalis. On the other hand, if temperature would easily influence the sex of pardalis, I think we would get into trouble because probaby more males would be bred and there would be a shortage of females I think.

 

[Eszzie]

Looking at the articles again about calyptratus I notice the temperatures tested are 25, 28 and 30 degrees Celcius. In the other article it is 24,5 26,5 and 29. The thing is that there is claimed that TSD was possible but only in temperature differences that are smaller than what so far has been tested.

for instance (it don't know the exact temperature, that's why I was looking for any information about that researce) testing it at 24,5 and 24,7 degrees Celcius.

It would be really hard to even influence the eggs if the difference is that small but even then with technology improvements temperature might be able to be kept stable at such detailed temperature and maybe have influence.

How do you guys think about that??