vitamins

[dingaling02]

As far as supplements, what would our pet chameleons do for calcium and all the other supplements in the wild. I am doing alot to keep up with all the dusting of crickets and gutloads, but it makes me wonder what the chams would do in the wild to stay alive...
thanks again guys,
Corey P

 

[Rob G]

Wild bugs are very rich in nutrition compared to captive feeders which have poor nutitional value by themselves. We gutload them to give the nutrients that the feeders eat to the cham and we dust with supps to add aditional value to the feeders.

 

[sandrachameleon]

ditto the above.
Also, in the wild a chameleon has opportunity to eat hundreds of different insects and more. In captivity, we simply cannot do that. Worse, some of the most commonly used insects in captivity, like crickets, have the exact opposite calcium to phosphorous ratio than is desireable (thus the calcium dusting).