What would be?

[DeFishy]

Hi all, I'm not on much, but my little panther chameleon is growing up fast I'm quite proud of her (at least, I'm almost 98% certain she is female, how do you tell by the way? Her colours are coming in as oranges/greens/with a bold white line (sorta spotty) down her sides). But she is still cheifly brownish. She's coming up to the 5-6" mark. Oh yea, my question. Ha ha. Well, originally I had planned to ask what kind of substrate would be good? I need to find a way to maintain humidity without having to constantly mist the enclosure. I can't have a live plant just yet, nor am I very comfortable doing this anyway. What I've been using so far with some minor success is a big bowl of water, paper towel, and frequent misting. But even then I'm even more worried as I've got her TEMPORARILY in a partial glass enclosure (yes, there is a screen, and I know it isn't the best, but I will be upgrading this next week to a full screen enclosure) Maybe soil? Maybe some sort of fern, or something? I don't know. I don't want to use bark, I know that it can cause impaction. What would you reccomend?

 

[sandrachameleon]

What type of chameleon is it?
In most cases, NO substrate is recommended, as in dont use one. Keep humidity up with misting, live plants, keeping the chameleon cage in a small room where you can increase ambient humidity, etc

 

[Lancecham]

If you post a picture of "her", I'm sure we can let you know what "she" is.
Lance

 

[Brad Ramsey]

I don't understand why you can't have or are not comfortable having live plants.

???

-Brad

 

[DeFishy]

Re

I've heard a lot of things about live plants causing problems, also they require extra care. How do you clean them anyway? I figured when she was a full adult I would get a large fiscus tree or something for her to climb on. But its hard to maintain heat in my area (I'm up in Canada, it gets cold up here). She is in a small room, my room. I made sure to put her in a place where it was the warmest, and my room is the warmest anyway. (Its at least 5 degrees warmer then the rest of the house). She is a panther, I wish I knew what type of panther. I can't post any pics No camera, not even a cell phone (mine broke). I'll see what I can do. Thanks for the advice.

 

[Brad Ramsey]

There is an article on plants (how to clean them etc.) and the benefits of including them in the enclosure here:

http://raisingkittytheveiledchameleon.blogspot.com/

-Brad

 

[sandrachameleon]

I've heard a lot of things about live plants causing problems, also they require extra care. How do you clean them anyway? I figured when she was a full adult I would get a large fiscus tree or something for her to climb on. But its hard to maintain heat in my area (I'm up in Canada, it gets cold up here). She is in a small room, my room. I made sure to put her in a place where it was the warmest, and my room is the warmest anyway. (Its at least 5 degrees warmer then the rest of the house). She is a panther, I wish I knew what type of panther. I can't post any pics No camera, not even a cell phone (mine broke). I'll see what I can do. Thanks for the advice.

I recommend trying a Pothos. Extremely easy to keep.
Check half way through this thread for what I do: https://www.chameleonforums.com/pothos-18207/
You can wash Pothos leaves of any poop fairly easily, and, as they grow so quickly, you could even just take /root new clippings and replace what's in the cage periodcially. If your chameleons cage is at the right temp, the pothos will be happy too. I have several living only in water on the window sill of my downstairs, unheated bathroom - its like 10C (50F) in there right now (Winter) and the pothos is fine.

 

[sandrachameleon]

...I'm almost 98% certain she is female, how do you tell by the way? Her colours are coming in as oranges/greens/with a bold white line (sorta spotty) down her sides). But she is still cheifly brownish.

She is a panther, I wish I knew what type of panther. I can't post any pics

How old is she? Even with pics, it would be difficult if not impossible to tell you what type of panther she is as the females all look very much alike. With males, one can make an educated guess based on colour.
check this website for some pictures to compare to: http://www.adcham.com/html/taxonomy/pardalismorphs.html

 

[DeFishy]

She is roughly between 5-6 months based on her size. And colours are starting to develop with greens, oranges, and blues.

 

[Sang]

greens oranges and blues? are they vibrant or dull... if they are really dull... then its a female.. i have yet to see a stunning female with an assortment of colors.


males have a buldge in the tail @ the vent *poop shoot*. females have a pretty then tail right pass the vent.


sounds like you may have a male, females tend to be bland matte colors... greys, pinks, purples, shades of peach

 

[summoner12]

I just wanted to add that pothos are great! For my two veileds I only have one pothos in each cage. The ones they have are so over grown they don't need anything else.

 

[DeFishy]

I might just do that I just bought her a very lovely full screen enclosure. It is a bit big for her, but I have fed her successfully out of a cup and by hand so I'm not worried about her not being able to find food. Now that the cage is larger I will need more plants. Lol. She's going through a major shed right now, lol. She'll probably be finished tomorrow. As for the colours, they are dull right now, but they come out clearly when she's a little stressed. She's usually a brown colour though. Odd, huh? I'll have to wait and see.