Veiled Only Wants "Junk Food"

[Green Pekoe]

Our female, who is coming up on five years old, only wants to eat hornworms, apple sauce and raspberries. She gets regular vitamins and is also on liquid calcium prescribed by the vet. She had a recent vet check that was went very well. How long can I let her live on this junk food diet before I drag her to the vet again (it is a bit of a haul so I try to avoid it as it is stressful for both of us)? This has been going on for about a month or so. Poops all look normal. Behaviour is her normal levels of grumpy. She's just done with fibre I guess.

I'm also open to other food ideas.

Thanks,

 

[GrannyK]

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  What other insects have you tried? Silkworms are a fav and grasshoppers in our house.

 

[GrannyK]

Welcome to the forum btw!! Wow 5 is great for your baby. Congrats on such a long time with her.

 

[MissSkittles]

Hi and welcome. I’m afraid the only way is to break her of the habit by only offering only nutritious bugs. She should not be receiving any plant matter and especially not fruits. They are very high in sugar and even though veiled will eat plant material, they have no need for it. The only plants she should have are all safe and live ones within her enclosure, that she’ll nibble on as the mood strikes her. As @GrannyK suggested, silkworms are a great staple food for her. Roaches are too, but for some chams they can be an acquired taste. Grasshoppers are also very well received and nutritious, but they can be hard to get. There are only a couple of sources for them at current. This is one. https://feedmychameleon.com/ Of course crickets are always an easily available and inexpensive feeder.
You’ll need to do some tough love. No healthy veiled chameleon has ever starved themself to death, but they can go quite a while without eating and still be fine. I had to tough love my leopard geckos out of their addictions to wax worms and it seemed like it took months with each barely eating a small cricket or other feeder every few weeks. It’s much harder on us than it is on them.

 

[kinyonga]

Raspberries…sugar content..”just 5 grams in an entire cup”..quite low as fruits go. Unsweetened apple sauce is higher at “20-25g of sugar per cup“.

I still wonder why so many veiled females in particular and some species of chameleons eat vegetation and other fruits and veggies, even in the wild if there is no need for it. I’m not saying we should feed them anything but insects, but I’m not 100% sold on there being no reason or need for it at times.

That being said…I would get your female off them anyway….maybe feed a bit of both to the insects for a few days so they have a bit of fruity taste would get her onto the insects more?

 

[Green Pekoe]

Thank you everyone for your feedback.

I took a look around and I can not get grasshoppers or roaches where I am. She has very little interest in silk worms, they are also a bit of a pain to get. Usually when she gets a raspberries, she gets one, and for her applesauce it is about a tablespoon, maybe two. Anything more and she leaves it in the dish. She gets hornworms once a month, but likely less. Her absolute favourite food is a fresh off the bush blackberry, she usually only gets about two or three of those a year. She's made it to five years old having fruit treats once every few weeks Her primary foods are crickets, wax worms and mealworms (usually a "salad"). Her vet is prefectly content with what we have been feeding her.

The only plant in her habitat she ever wanted to eat was a ficus that I had to remove as she almost killed it.

It has just been the last while that she has been ignoring her "crunchy" foods and wanting "squishy" foods. I have noticed that her hunting skills have declined since September. Her aim is off. I am thinking moving food may be too tough for her to catch.

I am of half a mind to think that she is now in "hospice" and at the end stages of her life. With my elderly cats my philosophy was "eh, eat what you want as long sit isn't outright poison." With a chameleon I don't know if this is a prudent course of action.

When shipping starts up again in the new year, I will try ordering some more buggy items off the list and try those.

 

[kinyonga]

Female veiled chameleons can live to be over 7 years old if the husbandry is right..especially if the egg production is limited to small or infrequent clutches…so she could have a few more years with you.

 

[MzLaurie]

I took in a rescue and everything I offered he seemed disinterested in. So I watched him very carefully and due to an injury caused by the seller, he could not target properly. He would try a couple of times and shoot off to the right, after two attempts he would give up. So I researched all greens I could but at the store and read everything I could find and it turns out collard greens has a lot of the vitamins they require. So I got some made a salad and he ate it right up. He loved hornworms cause they were easy to get. I would still offer crickets and got the shooting gallery which made it a bit easier. But the salads were a constant during his life. I was just so relieved he ate something. It was an easy meal. So there might be a reason and I figure animals know what they need. One thing about salads, I would dust it I knew he was getting his supplements. There might be nutrients in the things you offer that she needs. Curious to know if she’s turned down other things you have offered. You might want to switch to collard grrens. I would get a stalk wash it really good and put it in a container with water at the bottom like you do with flowers. Put it in the frig and cut from the top down. I had a bowl just for salads and would toss what wasn’t eaten the day before and gave it two to three times a week. A stalk would last over a month. I have seen other owners tie an entire leaf to a vine and they would eat that way too. Mine never did, but I saw a clutch of baby chams tear it apart. It was so cute!

 

[jannb]

Silkworms are excellent soft feeders for her.
Please post some pictures so we can see your girl.

 

[MissSkittles]

I agree that at end of life, a correct diet matters little. The issue with this philosophy with chameleons, is that it’s often near impossible to tell when it is truly their time and we could risk artificially shortening their lives. An occasional berry shouldn’t be a problem, but I wouldn’t give applesauce at all. As @kinyonga suggested, it would be more beneficial to feed those items to your crickets. I do also advise against wax worms and mealworms being staple feeders. Wax worms are very fatty and should be treats only. Mealworms are just poor feeders with more chitin than ‘meat’. Superworms would be a better choice, but again, those too are fatty and for treats only. What other feeders have you tried? Black soldier fly larvae (bsfl) is a great feeder and I like to let them pupate into flies to give my chameleons some hunting enrichment. Even my older girl who no longer shoots her tongue more than an inch or so enjoys hunting the flies and she does catch them.
You’ve had your girl for 5 years, which is a fantastic achievement so I am very hesitant to question your husbandry. However, I will ask about your uvb light. What type and strength do you use? What is the distance between the uvb light and her basking area? When was the uvb bulb changed last? What brand of bulb?
Have you noticed any other changes or signs of decline? Have you checked inside of her mouth to ensure that everything is healthy - no sores, broken teeth or anything? It would be great if you shared some pics, if for no other reason than to show off her beauty.

 

[kinyonga]

Glad @MissSkittles touched on the fattiness of the wax worms and the chitin in the mealworms. I meant to mention that but got sidetracked. (I must be getting old!)

Please post some photos of her so we can see if there are signs of aging, etc.