Treating Dehydration at Home in an Unconventional Way

[Andee]

So Ryker has gotten a bit dehydrated since I had to turn off the mistking to clean it thoroughly for a few days, because he has a developed a problem with drinking from the hand mister and actually getting stimulated to drink enough even after its gone.I have been misting him for 3 minutes each time with hot water which turns warm when it's made into mist. Needless to say I have been going out of my mind. I have tried showers and they don't work well at the moment, so I decided to do something... rather different. Now as a warning to new and unexperienced keepers, I do not recommend doing this unless you feel comfortable giving your chameleon fluids orally and not causing them to aspirate and get pneumonia. In order to do that I would suggest studying the anatomy of a chameleon's airway and talking to either experienced keepers or a vet. What I ended up doing to make sure he was getting some fluids, I gave him warm water orally through an oral syringe ( I have a lot lying around from rescues). I started out with 1.0 unit, and gave it to him slowly, allowing him to swallow every .3 units. Of course he didn't really enjoy it, but Ryker is rather understanding and accepting of what I do to him, even if he doesn't really enjoy it. However about 3 hours later after the second oral syringe of .7 units he was perky again and actually drinking from the droplets from his misting. However I was extremely careful to put the oral syringe in the far back of his mouth to avoid his air way. I would strongly recommend this if you are dealing with a stubborn and mildly dehydrated cham. But I would not give more than 1.0 units at a time, I am not sure how much water a chameleon's gut can hold, but my full grown panther seemed to have now problem with 1.0 units. Just give it to them slow and allow swallowing. If you have a smaller species of chameleon, like a Jackson's depending on the size I wouldn't go over .7 units and would stay more around .5 just to be safe.

Any thoughts on this?

 

[WAMBO]

That sounds like you are using a 1cc TB syringe, so 0.3 units would be 0.3 cc.

 

[Andee]

Yes, I am, I never knew the medical term for it. But yes it is the typical oral syringe they give you at a vets office for delivering antibiotics. I have a lot because I have taken on a lot of rehabilitation cases that needed antibiotics or liquid calcium of some sort. Thanks for the clarification <3