Reptile & Amphibian Forums

One of my baby veiled chameleons that hatched in October is starting to exhibit wierd behavior. He is laying on the groun grasping his front legs with his back legs. I've seen this before in some of the chameleons when they first hatched, but they seemed to stop doing it after a day or two. This one has been doing it for almost 3 days. He kind of wiggles around but does not let go of his legs. I make sure they are fed sufficiently as well as properly supplied with calcium. He is housed with 2 other babies of the same age, one of which is a male and the other a female. Of the three of them he is by far the biggest and healthiest and was doing great a couple of days ago. Does anyone know what could be going on with him? Have any of you witnessed this type of behavior before? Thank you.

I have seen this leg grasping before, and its usually went along with an imbalance in the calcium/D3/vitamin A, etc. in the chameleon's diet. I think (I'm not a vet...so this is just my opinion) that the fact that he is growing faster than the rest can cause the imbalance to be worse than if he were growing slower.

Do his legs have any unusual shape to them? Are they straight between the top and the knees, knees and ankles, upper arms? Does he look like he has an extra elbow above the elbow in his arms?

You said..."I make sure they are fed sufficiently as well as properly supplied with calcium"...calcium is not the only thing that is needed to have strong bones. It works with vitamin D3 and vitamin A (and likely more) in a balance as I said above.

You said..."He is housed with 2 other babies of the same age, one of which is a male and the other a female"...if they are older than about 4 months, they should be separated.

There are some good articles on chameleonjournals that talk about the calcium/D3/vitamin A balance.