white crust on nose

my veiled cham has white crust on her nostrils, i took a damp qtip and easily wiped it off. i use zilla calcium spray everyday because my vet said she has metabolic bone disease. how do i know how much calcium is enough? she eats about 15-20 crickets/or 25 mealworms a day. is wiping off the white crust ok? does it hurt her? she wasnt breathing with her mouth open...yet.

usually that white is salt. They have glands that excretes the salt from their system. Wiping it with a wet Q-Tip is okay just be very careful they don't freak out and move.

You can imagine how hurt they could become poking them with the q-tip

Do you have a UBV bulb that is less than 6mths old?

Here is a care sheet for you
https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/chameleonsinmyhouse/395-veiled-chameleon-care-sheet.html

i just replaced my bulb about a week and a half ago. i feel terrible poking at her with a qtip everyday but i have to clean her mouth out also because she has an infection in her mouth due to a bad shed (says the vet) so i clean out the infection daily and put a cream on her mouth. should i be spraying the insects less? i use reptisafe in her water and when i mist her.

infection from shed? Does she have a popping or wheezing sound when she is breathing?

Keep up the calcium- I am not familiar with that brand but with MBD she needs the calcium.

Can you post some photos of her please?

Regarding mouth rot...in most cases it needs to be cleaned out well by the vet and a culture and sensitivity test done on the exudate to determine what antibiotic the chameleon should be put on. In most cases if this is not done, even if the infection seems to clear up it will either recur in the mouth or elsewhere in the chameleon. The bacteria usually involved is pseudomonas and is an opportunistic gram negative bacteria.

If she has MBD the best way to get it under control is to have the vet give her injections of calcium until the blood calcium levels are high enough that she can be given a shot of calcitonin to draw the calcium back rapidly into the bones.

In addition to correcting the calcium levels, once the MBD is under control you need to make sure that she receives proper nutrients in balance along with proper UVB to keep it from coming back.

Here's some information I hope will help you with things like supplements, gutloading, etc....
Appropriate cage temperatures aid in digestion and thus play a part indirectly in nutrient absorption.

Exposure to UVB from either direct sunlight or a proper UVB light allows the chameleon to produce D3 so that it can use the calcium in its system to make/keep the bones strong and be used in other systems in the chameleon as well. The UVB should not pass through glass or plastic no matter whether its from the sun or the UVB light. The most often recommended UVB light is the long linear fluorescent Repti-sun 5.0 tube light. Some of the compacts, spirals and tube lights have caused health issues, but so far there have been no bad reports against this one.

A wide variety of insects that have been well fed and gutloaded should be fed to it.

Since many of the feeder insects we use in captivity have a poor ratio of calcium to phosphorus in them, its important to dust the insects just before you feed them to the chameleon at most feedings with a phos.-free calcium powder to help make up for it. (I use Rep-cal phosphorus-free calcium).

If you also dust twice a month with a phos.-free calcium/D3 powder it will ensure that your chameleon gets some D3 without overdoing it. It leaves the chameleon to produce the rest of what it needs through its exposure to the UVB light. D3 from supplements can build up in the system but D3 produced from exposure to UVB shouldn't as long as the chameleon can move in and out of it. (I use Rep-cal phos.-free calcium/D3).

Dusting twice a month as well with a vitamin powder that contains a beta carotene (prOformed) source of vitamin A will ensure that the chameleon gets some vitamins without the danger of overdosing the vitamin A. PrEformed sources of vitamin A can build up in the system and may prevent the D3 from doing its job and push the chameleon towards MBD. However, there is controversy as to whether all/any chameleons can convert the beta carotene and so some people give some prEformed vitamin A once in a while. (I use herptivite which has beta carotene.)

Gutloading/feeding the insects well helps to provide what the chameleon needs. I gutload crickets, roaches, locusts, superworms, etc. with an assortment of greens (dandelions, kale, collards, endive, escarole, mustard greens, etc.) and veggies (carrots, squash, sweet potato, sweet red pepper, zucchini, etc.)

Calcium, phos., D3 and vitamin A are important players in bone health and other systems in the chameleon (muscles, etc.) and they need to be in balance. When trying to balance them, you need to look at the supplements, what you feed the insects and what you feed the chameleon.
Please note that various supplements have various amounts of D3 and vitamin A and so some can be given more often than others. The idea still is not to overdo the fat soluble vitamins like D3 and prEformed vitamin A.

Here are some good sites for you to read too...
http://chameleonnews.com/07FebWheelock.html
http://web.archive.org/web/200605020...Vitamin.A.html
http://web.archive.org/web/200406080...d.Calcium.html
http://www.uvguide.co.uk/
http://web.archive.org/web/200601140...ww.adcham.com/
If you can't access the sites above that have the word "archive" in you can do it through the WayBackMachine.


One more thing...if she's sexually mature, I would recommend putting an opaque container at least 12" deep x 12" x 8" filled with washed playsand in her cage so that if she needs to lay eggs, she has a place to dig to let you know. Veileds can lay eggs without having mated.
Good luck with her!

my vet said her last shed was a bad shed. it took her a long time to get her skin off and she still didnt get all of it off. she does not have a popping or wheezing sound when she breathes. she also breathes with her mouth closed.

I had this same problem. dont worry easy fix lower your calcium intake, that should fix it right up! Jade (my chameleon) has Mbd also. but its cleared a good bit up. Anyways, the white crust is just her body "shedding" access mineral's, vitimins, ect. Jade has no more crust. try this and it should be all fine.

Ps. it doesnt hurt the chameleon.

@kinyonga
i can try and post pics of her. i already took the white stuff off her nostril but i can show you pics of her mouth.
the vet cleaned out the infection really good and gave me a silver sulfadiazine cream to apply to her mouth. he said in about a week or so the infection should go away. the vet also gave her a shot of vitamins a,d and e. why shouldnt the uvb light pass thru glass? could that be my problem? i had it on the outside of her tank. she doesnt eat insects that are dusted with a powder so i am trying a new calcium spray. i was using reptivite with d3 (powder) but she likes this spray better. it is zilla food spray calcium supplement. i feed her only gutloaded insects. crickets, mealworms, waxworms, roaches, but im not sure how to get to eat veggies and what kind is best for her to try first and how should i introduce them to her? shes about a year old. i will check out these sites. thanks for the help! i appreciate every bit i can get.

why shouldnt the uvb light pass thru glass? could that be my problem?

Click to expand...

Yes, that is likely your problem. The UVB doesn't pass through glass. That's why you don't get a sunburn through a closed window. The glass filters the UVB rays out. Your light should be on a mesh or screen side.

By the way, Hi! I hope things improve with your chameleon, I know how painful it can be to have them sickly.

I wanted to see photos of all of her so I can see if there are signs of MBD...but also of the mouth area.

Silversulfadiazine is a good choice for applying to the mouth...but it still depends on how bad the rot is as to whether it will be enough.

You said..."why shouldnt the uvb light pass thru glass?"...the UVB is no good after it passes through glass or plastic.

To get them to eat greens, veggies and a small amount of fruit...you can chop some up and put it in a dish/lid on the floor of the cage....the insects will eat it and if the chameleon shoots at the insect it might ingest some of the "salad" and learn that it tastes good. You can also put impale a leafy green on a branch or attach it to the branch. Another thing I find that works well is to take a thin wedge of apple (for example) and when the chameleon's mouth is open stick it between its teeth so it will bite it when it shuts its mouth.

The veggies and greens that you can use are the same ones listed in the gutload...cut to appropriate sizes or into thin sticks/wedges. The fruits can include apple, pear, melon, berries, etc.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...08550396347.2098675.1319430140&type=1&theater

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...08550396347.2098675.1319430140&type=1&theater
let me know if you can see these pics. the one where she is sleeping i just now took. the cream on her mouth is the silver cream. the green spotted one was taken about 5 days ago.

Doesn't let us see the picture.

i hope this one works. sorry if it doesnt upload.

ok the last one looks like it posted so i tried it again with a pic i just took tonight.

You've got yourself a pretty female.

thank you =) i think shes beautiful.

She is pretty indeed. If she has MBD it's certainly been caught before she could suffer any serious repercussions. I don't see any breaks in the limbs I can see.

With regard to the white crust and decreasing your calcium supplementation. As your chameleon has an MBD issue, I don't think you should do that. The white crusts are unimportant. They might be unappealing looking, but they are not harmful. You can try upping the misting to see if that helps them go away and it doesn't hurt to brush them off with a finger tip or Q-tip, but there isn't a need to do so.

this is how her mouth looked right before i took her to the vet. she sleeps in my hand when i hold her at night. this bump on her mouth started small and got this big after a week.
after i cleaned her mouth and applied the cream, the infection is slowly going away but looks a million times better.

I'm going to recommend you do not hold her. While it's wonderful to believe they are "sleeping in your hand" (I've done it) the fact is, no prey animal would do that willingly. Make sure her cage is a safe environment where she can "hide" and leave her there as much as possible.

I hate to say it because I know how I felt when I thought my chameleon "sleeping" in my hand was some sign of trust....the horrible fact is, it's not. The chameleon doesn't trust you, it doesn't feel peaceful, it's just shutting down because the situation is too difficult for it to deal with.

=( ok. but what about still cleaning her mouth everyday? and she eats out of my hand almost daily also. she doesnt normally "sleep" in my hand usually just sits and looks.