T. deremensis Breeding

[Tree top]

Hi my name is Gord Nagy.... I joined this forum this past summer. This is my
first post .
I got a WC pair of T.deremensis, which I have been aucumatting since August.
I tried breeding them in Oct and Nov,with no luck. On Dec 5th I introduced
them and they bred with in seconds.Tried breeding them today and same
thing with in seconds they bred.
Any members out there that have bred T.demensis before any info. would be
great.

Thanks , Gord

 

[robertc]

Hi, I had a gravid female two years ago. Unfortunately, she died of some skin desease a few days before egg laying.

As far as I now, deremensis are usually allowed to mate many times, my pair did it every morning for a month. The copulation always lasted about 10 minutes.

It is suggested to prevent females from overeating, otherwise they develop too many too large eggs.

 

[Tree top]

The copulation lasted about 10 minutes both times as well with mine.I have been keeping
them apart to keep sperm count up...I will see if it works.


Thank you ,Gord

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

An old breeder friend of mine was one of the first to legitamately captive breed deremensis. He would breed the females seasonally and only once a year. I would recomend buying the CIN issue about breeding deremensis it has a lot of detail about captive breeding this species.

 

[robertc]

At the beginning, I also separated them after copulation. However, I was later told by an expert to let them in the same cage untill the female changes her color (green turns to black).

Two copulations may not be enough. In Septemberer, I happened to see twice a copulation of my pair of Melleri, but it seems that the female is not gravid.

 

[stevie]

i've bred them and still breeding them , i leave mi females with the male tile she turns black than seperate them because they copulate several times

 

[Kent67]

Nice work, Gord! Thanks for posting your experience and progress. I have a scan of the CiN article Motherlode Chameleon mentioned if you'd like to read it. I still haven't attempted breeding this species but have a pair from "the merumontanus(another member here) clutch" and guess it's time to consider getting mates for them. Hope she goes gravid soon!

 

[Chuck G]

I have sucessfully hatched 2 groups of eggs. I have lost a couple of females that tried unsucessfully to lay eggs. One of them had very large eggs that are viable and the other one had many infertile eggs. That is a very interesting point to leave them together that long while breeding. I will give it a try.

 

[stevie]

I have sucessfully hatched 2 groups of eggs. I have lost a couple of females that tried unsucessfully to lay eggs. One of them had very large eggs that are viable and the other one had many infertile eggs. That is a very interesting point to leave them together that long while breeding. I will give it a try.

last time they dit about 7 times in a week , iv'e seen it 7 times who knowes wat they dit when i was at work

 

[Tree top]

kent67
I would love to get a copy of the CIN article , Mother Load Chameleon mentioned. Thanks,
My e-mail is [email protected] I was leaving the pair together for about two days, after copulation. I didnt see anything, they could have bred when I wasnt around.Then I separated them, and reintrodued them a few days later.

Thanks every one for responding any other tips or info , would be appreciated.

Gord

 

[jmart]

Hi,

I would also like to get a copy of that issue! My email is [email protected].

The female I have is too small for breeding though. I will have to wait until next year.

 

[chamelisa]

Hi my name is Gord Nagy.... I joined this forum this past summer. This is my
first post .
I got a WC pair of T.deremensis, which I have been aucumatting since August.
I tried breeding them in Oct and Nov,with no luck. On Dec 5th I introduced
them and they bred with in seconds.Tried breeding them today and same
thing with in seconds they bred.
Any members out there that have bred T.demensis before any info. would be
great.

Thanks , Gord

That's very exciting! I hope you have success with this breeding. They are beautiful chameleons. I only know of a couple people who have bred them. It's been a while.

 

[luevelvet]

Congratulations on a successful breeding! We've raised a few clutches and have committed much our efforts to continuing work with T. deremensis.

We cool ours down around this time of the year and notice the males will usually stop eating and roam about their enclosures until they find a female. They can be quite relentless and track over every inch of their cage in search for one. This is when we usually introduce the males into the females enclosure and let them be until, as mentioned earlier, she turns dark with spots.

Gestation is about 2-4 months and incubation is almost exactly 4 months. It's rather uncanny really.

Good luck and keep us posted. I'm always excited to hear about others working with this species. It's certainly one our favorites!

Cheers!

Luis

 

[Dooley1]

Luis,

Do you notice the males wanting to breed while they are being kept cooler, or after you "warm" them back up? Do you have any more details you can offer, such as temps., or how you accomplish it, such as changing ambient temps. or adding/increasing wattage of a spotlight? How long do you cool them? Finally, do you manipulate the photoperiod?

 

[Tree top]

Hi luis
My male has also stopped eating, and is roaming the enclosure constantly.They bred twice since I last posted...so I have seen four copulations , she hasnt turned black with spots yet.She has been in his cage since the last breeding, yesterday.Today , I seen the male rush up to her gaping his mouth at her, and rammed her right off the branch.I took her out of the enclosure because he seemed to be chasing her around he cage, trying to bite her.Any of the breedings I have seen so far , he bobbs his head about three times very quickly.And then slowly approaches her and mounts her.Where as this behavior I seen to day seemed alot more aggressive, Not like a breeding bite. As anyone else seen this behavior? I guess I will reintroduce her tomorrow, and see what happens.

Thanks for respounding
Gord

 

[robertc]

In my case, the male was aggressive first few days of mating. I guess it might be a mehod to make the female to change the position for a more suitable one. My melleri male uses a similar technique too, attacking the female with his horn, he makes her slowly walking so that he could comfortably approach her.

I did not separate the couple during the breeding time. They were breeding every morning, the rest of the day they did not care about each other. Maybe I should also note that I have pretty large cages, two cubic metres each.

The roaming may mean not only that the male searches for a female, he may also search for more winter-like conditions. My deremensis wants less light and lower temperature now.

 

[Tree top]

robertc

I also keep mine in large cages,about 5ft long and about 30inches wide.4ft high. I think his roaming is just looking for the female,because his cage ranges from the low 60 s to the high 60 s, I have a 50watt spotlamp kept about two foot away from his perch, which creates a hot spot of about 75.I know a lot pf people say the species dont like bright light and dont bask much.But the male loves to bask, the female stays to the darker areas of her cage, underneath the heavy foilage and rarely basking.

I introduced the female again tonight, and they bred right away, as soon as they were finished and she went to walk off, he charged her again with his mouth open.chasing her down to the bottom of the cage.I think I will keep on taking the female out of the cage after breeding and reintroduce them the next day, be less stress on her instead of letting him chase her down to the floor of the cage and have her sit there all day

 

[luevelvet]

If they've successfully bred more than a few times there is no need to continue stressing her out over the situation.

We don't do anything special to lower/raise the temps. Our seasonal changes are enough for them to notice the difference. This time of the year it can get as low as 55° at night and not go above 65° during the day (in the cham room). On this cycle we've noticed them becoming sexual receptive/active in late December through January. The temps begin to rise February through April to a max of about 78°-80°.

We do decrease the photo period from 12 to 8 hours for a few months, but they seem to take the cues from the natural light cycle outside the big window in their room, rather than what we set the timers to.

Co-habitating any species is tricky, including deremensis. One day they can seem perfectly fine together just to find them fighting (or worse) the next. We house all of our separately unless they've been long term cage mates, but even then I keep a close eye on them. I typically remove the males as soon as either of them show any signs of stress or discomfort, but with our group, it's usually the female that is done with the male than the opposite.

Cheers!

Luis

 

[robertc]

Concerning the light, I had the same experience. It semed strange to me, because I did not think that there can be such a darkness in the forest, so I tried to use "day light" bulbs instead of cheaper "warm white". And it works.

 

[chdwckvnstrsslhm]

semi-off topic question

Does anyone know where there is information on how to care for these guys? Such as temp/humidity range and such?

I'd been considering getting a pair, but haven't really been able to find much information on how to care for them...

thanks