Two month check up, how’s it look?

[DocZ]

I’ve had Calcifer for about two months. I’ve learned a great deal from all of you and other resources about how best to care for him. This is the first chameleon cage I’ve done in 25 years, so it’s been two months I’ve tinkered and changed some things how does all of this look? Thanks ?
Chameleon Info:

• Your Chameleon - Calcifer is a 5 month-old, male Amilobe panther chameleon, and he’s been with us for about 2 months
• Handling - He prefers I don’t even look at him.
• Feeding - Calcifer is fed some combination of banded crickets, silkworms, Dubias, discoids, and occasional superworms. About 6-8 daily total in a couple of feedings. Gut loading with dandelion greens, alfalfa sprouts, acorn and butternut squash, carrots, bell peppers, chorella and spirulina powder, and bee pollen
• Supplements - Daily with Zoomed calcium without D3, seventh day alternates between repashy LoD and Herptivite
• Watering - Mistking 2 minutes twice overnight and once for two minutes just after the lights come on. A fogger runs overnight as well. An automatic dripper runs 4 times for 5 minutes each day. I have seen him drinking from the automatic dripper
• Fecal Description - Brown well formed feces with slightly yellow/white urates. He has not had a fecal float done
• History - Any previous information about your cham that might be useful to others when trying to help you.

Cage Info:

• Cage Type - He lives in a Tall screen Dragonstrand cage 2x2x4
• Lighting - Zoomed reptisun 24” UVB/LED with a Zoomed 5.0, 60W incandescent in a dual dome, and 2 reptisun LEDs. The basking bulb ramps up from 7-8AM then the rest of the lights come on at 8am. Off at 8PM.
• Temperature - Basking branch is set to 83.5. This creates about 85-86 a few inches above his branch. The range goes from mid to high 80s at the ceiling to 72-73 at the bottom during the day. Overnight lows can be 63-66. There’s a digital thermometer in the cage, the basking spot is regulated by a Herpstat 2, and I have a temp gun to dial in the maximum cage temps.
• Humidity - Humidity is 45-50% during the day. Up to 80-90% at night. Daytime humidity is maintained by the plants I suppose. Nighttime humidity is raised with misting and a fogger. There is a hygrometer and herpstat hygrostat in the cage.
• Plants - Mostly live. There’s pothos, pilea, syngonium, and aglaonema. There’s a couple of plastic plants in there to cover some ugly spots, and one that hides Calcifer’s favorite sleeping and hiding spot
• Placement - It’s in the basement, the closest vents are closed. The top of the cage is a little over 6 feet off the ground.
• Location - Omaha, NE

 

[Beman]

Supplements - Daily with Zoomed calcium without D3, seventh day alternates between repashy LoD and Herptivite

So you want to drop the herptivite and only use the LoD 2 times a month. calcium without D3 at all other feedings.

Feeding - Calcifer is fed some combination of banded crickets, silkworms, Dubias, discoids, and occasional superworms. About 6-8 daily total in a couple of feedings.

So your only giving him 6-8 feeders a day? If that is the case. At 5 months old he should be getting more like 12 feeders a day.

Everything else looks great

 

[DocZ]

@Beman thank you!
So I’m not sure I want to drop the Herptivite. It has a different vitamin and amino acid profile than the repashy LoD. While I would guess much of these vitamins and amino acids show up in his prey, I’m reluctant remove them entirely since it’s unknown which are most helpful to their health

If he’d take more food, I’d give it to him. He’s very shy and after he eats a few feeders, he usually runs and hides from me. He has used the feeder run sporadically, but rarely empties it out just takes a roach or two and the superworm if he got one that day. However, his discoids are on the big side for him certainly would have the content of 2+ small ones and he will take pretty big silkworms.

He’s shed 3 times in the 2 months we’ve had him so he’s seems to be growing pretty well. Hopefully he’ll become more tolerant of me. He’ll reluctantly take cricket from my fingers, but those are his favorites.

 

[Chameleomom]

I agree with @Beman you are going to over supplement your chameleon. It will show up sooner or later. You were given solid advice but are choosing not to take it. Your call.

 

[DocZ]

I’m up for discussion. What is going to be over-supplemented?

 

[Chameleomom]

Repashy calcium plus lo D has vitamins in it. You don't need the herptivite also

 

[DocZ]

I know it does, and it has things that loD doesn’t too. Which of the vitamins should I be worried about over-supplementing

 

[Beman]

I know it does, and it has things that loD doesn’t too. Which of the vitamins should I be worried about over-supplementing

Multivitamins and Calcium with D3 should only be supplemented 2 times a month every other week at 1 feeding. Your doubling up on the multivitamins by supplementing with both types 2 times each. Herptivite is a less then ideal supplement because it does not contain preformed A for eye health. This is why I said to drop this one.

So if your going to supplement you pick the one that you have that offers the best which is the repashy LoD. This is both a multivitamin and Calcium with D3. They also have preformed A in theirs. So this one is superior to the herptivite and is the one that is best to use.

But still it is only 2 times a month. If you continue to supplement every week you will eventually have an issue of over supplementation. Too much multivitamin. And a lot of it is not water soluble it is fat soluble so it stores in the tissues and takes time to leave the body.

 

[DocZ]

Thanks you. I appreciate your help and experience.
I wish there was more information on what might be too much.
I’d suspect organ failure from vitamin toxicity to be what we’re worried about. I can find articles about protective effects against hepatotoxicity and nephrotoxicity with vitamin e antioxidants. After some more searching, I did find meta analyses that showed a modest increase in all cause mortality in humans from beta-carotene, vitamin a, and vitamin e. There’s also some thought e can effect absorption of a and k, although they only guessed that K was affected due to mildly increased bleeding risk from a possible lack of vitamin K dependent coagulation factors. Herptivite would be an extra dose of E, A is only in the LoD, and the association with beta carotene likely doesn’t apply to lizards since the bugs (accept silkworms and some species of katydids and beetles) nor the Cham can convert beta carotene to A

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17327526/

Vitamin c and selenium did not have any association with all cause mortality in humans

B6 and B12 do not seem to have toxic doses

Regarding amino acid profiles I can find a little evidence that supplementation May be unnecessary but not toxic.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4473169/

I take your point, but only see evidence for vitamin E as a possible source of oversupplementation thus far. It’s probably enough to not use it.

 

[DocZ]

@Beman i hope you don’t take my reluctance as being argumentative or obstinate (I am some times, but that’s not the point?). But this is the venue where “why” has to accompany the “rules”.

You guys have created a collective of very experienced and knowledgeable keepers and it’s awesome. It would be a shame if all you do is tell people the rules, but ignore the why. As a group, you may be able to elucidate some level of “scientific” evidence if you tried.

I would guess the funding for chameleon-specific research is fairly limited, so most of these questions will go unanswered.

 

[jamest0o0]

I see nothing wrong with your supplement schedule, the main thing to look out for are fat soluble vitamins that can build up like retinol and vitamin d3 which you seem aware of. Ive brought this up before when we say "multivitamin" what are we even talking about? Multivitamin could be bee pollen, it could be a gutload blend of fruits/veggies, and so on.

 

[Beman]

@Beman i hope you don’t take my reluctance as being argumentative or obstinate (I am some times, but that’s not the point?). But this is the venue where “why” has to accompany the “rules”.

You guys have created a collective of very experienced and knowledgeable keepers and it’s awesome. It would be a shame if all you do is tell people the rules, but ignore the why. As a group, you may be able to elucidate some level of “scientific” evidence if you tried.

I would guess the funding for chameleon-specific research is fairly limited, so most of these questions will go unanswered.

It is your chameleon. Do as you wish...

 

[kinyonga]

For many years I've used Herptivite twice a month lightly for all my chameleons, RepCal phos free calcium with D3 lightly twice a month, and RepCal without D3 lightly at every feeding except the two that I use Herptivite at and the two I use RepCal/D3. Almost all my veiled females lived to be over six and most of them to be over 7 with males living even longer, for example.

I've fed/gutloaded crickets, superworms, etc with dandelion greens, kale, endive, escarole, squash, zucchini, collards, sweet red pepper, sweet potato, carrots, etc. and a small amount of fruit such as apples, pears, berries, etc.

I've rarely had a chameleon with gular edema, egg laying issues, shedding problems, MBD, etc. Almost all the bodies have been taken to a veterinarian college for necropsies when they died and I don't really remember organ damage mentioned as a cause of death very often. (Don't forget, I've had a lot of WC's that come in with issues that were not caused by me.)

I did have one female Panther chameleon that had weaker babies hatch from her eggs a couple of times but she was wild caught and may have had issues I wasn't aware of when I got her. She seemed to be a little bit weak herself...but we could never find out a reason. She might just have been old.

Granted Herptivite has no prEformed vitamin A so my chameleons could lack vitamin A if its true that they can't convert beta carotene...but there should be signs.

Vitamin A and vitamin D are somewhat antagonistic to each other so if they are not in balance it usually affects bone health (for one thing).

Now, the longevity and health of my chameleons doesn't prove that what I'm doing is the only way or exactly right but I have felt that if my adults live pretty good long healthy lives the way I keep them ...and the babies that I keep back have good lives and breed and produce healthy babies, etc I must be somewhere within the right parameters. Or am I wrong?

As for proof...I don't think there is any absolute proof or study out there yet.

 

[kinyonga]

Insects and vitamin A....and other nutrients...
"Retinoids are only found in the compound eyes of insects where they are synthesized from their carotenoid precursors and the retinoid synthesized (typically either retinal or 3‐OH retinal) is species specific [Smith and Goldsmith, 1990; Seki et al., 1998]. For that reason it is not surprising that retinol is rarely detected in whole insects. A better understanding of the vitamin A content of insects and the utilization of various insect retinoids and carotenoids as a source of vitamin A is important as vitamin A deficiency has been reported in several species of captive insectivores"...
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/zoo.21246

 

[DocZ]

Insects and vitamin A....and other nutrients...
"Retinoids are only found in the compound eyes of insects where they are synthesized from their carotenoid precursors and the retinoid synthesized (typically either retinal or 3‐OH retinal) is species specific [Smith and Goldsmith, 1990; Seki et al., 1998]. For that reason it is not surprising that retinol is rarely detected in whole insects. A better understanding of the vitamin A content of insects and the utilization of various insect retinoids and carotenoids as a source of vitamin A is important as vitamin A deficiency has been reported in several species of captive insectivores"...
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/zoo.21246

That’s a good article. Thanks for posting it. If they have retinal in their eyes they have to be converting beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, or beta-cryptoxanthin from what I read.

So perhaps they only convert small amounts for their eyes? Or maybe their eyes rapidly uptake retinal so little is present In their tissue?
With proper gut loading is there enough carotenes to provide them the vitamin a forms they need?

 

[kinyonga]

That’s a good article. Thanks for posting it. If they have retinal in their eyes they have to be converting beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, or beta-cryptoxanthin from what I read.

So perhaps they only convert small amounts for their eyes? Or maybe their eyes rapidly uptake retinal so little is present In their tissue?
With proper gut loading is there enough carotenes to provide them the vitamin a forms they need?

I need to do more research on it...but I think there is more vitamin A in insects than we think. It might not be stored where we expect it to be so maybe it doesn't show up?

I'm still not sure that some chameleons can't convert it. I think some can better than others.

 

[DocZ]

Keep researching, and keep me posted. I really love this stuff

 

[kinyonga]

I will. I love this stuff too!