Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was looking up silkworm stuff and i had a thought. Are there any live mulberry trees that can be part of a chameleon enclosure? Are mulberry trees toxic to chameleons?

I was thinking that would keep me from having to buy silkworm chow. Whenever i needed food i would just pluck a couple of leaves. Plus i could put a couple at a time in the cage with my chameleon. They would eat, he would hunt them down.

just a thought,
Jeff

Silkworms go through mulberry leaves like a buzzsaw. I think keeping enough leaves to feed the silkies and still keep the tree alive and growing would be difficult. Diane
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dianedfisher@yahoo.com

My 3 CWD-Avanyu, Tripod and Drago
Valentino, Veiled Chameleon
Chyam, Nosy Be Panther Chameleon

I recently bought a mulberry tree as a food source for silkworms. It is about the size you could fit into a typical chameleon enlosure 4x2x2. I had the same idea as you, but wanted to find out if it was safe first. When my first shipment of worms came in(100) I plucked 8 leaves and dropped them in with the silkies. I went and washed my hands and when I returned minutes later the leaves were GONE, stems and all. I was barely able to keep the worms alive for the 2 weeks it took my cham to eat them all. I had the worms on a starvation diet and used more than HALF of the leaves from the tree. The worms were getting very week towards the end and probably had low nutritional value. My point is, it would take a large yard size tree to sustain even a small amount of silkworms. I planted it in my yard already. The plus side is, the trees are very durable(mine is recovering although it still looks scraggly) and the fruit is delicious. I never found out if they are safe for chams. My guess is yes since you can feed worms that ate the leaves, but that is just a guess.

Damn, hungry little bastards. hehe, thanks for the info. is it plausable to do the same thing i suggested with another caterpillar that chameleons eat?

Guess what...Mulberry Trees are -yuo you guess it TREES! Ok just playing with you here, but they dp require a very large area to grow in and a 4x3x3 cage will not cut it7!7,

You either need to start a small nursery outside with these trees stagared in age SO you wilk always have something producibel or stick with the chow/buy it in bulk if silkies are a main feeder for you

have fun!
lele
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Chameleon Help & Resource Info
1.0 Nosy Be Panther Chameleon - Cyrus
0.1 Veiled Chameleon - Luna. She's now hanging from her big jungle gym in the sky
1.0 Beardie - Darwin
1.1.1 Side-blotched lizards - Ana and Stan
0.2 felines - Kyndra and Lita
0.1 African Clawed Frog - Skippy
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula - Rosa Leigh, Died 4/21/06
0.1 Goliath Bird-Eater Tarantula - Natasha, donated to science 4/4/06
?.? Pinktoe Tarantula - no name yet

Yeah, but i was hoping that maybe there was a dwarf variety that would fit in an enclosure. I guess there is.... it just needs to be a BIG enclosure hehe.

the larval stage of any Lepidoptera are virtual eating machines. I raise 8 species of Saturniid moths (not as feeders) and believe me, it is a lot of work to keep them in fresh food whether inside or out.

You would need to find some safe fruit worm or other caterpillar that is not too picky about its food but they rarely get very large and they often wrap themselves (or stitch together) leaves as they feed. So a neat idea but I really don't think it would be worth the effort unless you have a greenhouse.

I did recently read an article about feeding hornworms non-toxic plants, but even if you were successful in this you would still need a LOT of plant and keep in mind - caterpillars are pooping machines, too. If you don;t clean up their frass and it gets wet fungus, bacteria and virus can easily spread (among the cats)

Here's a link to article on hornworms. hmmm, thought I knew where it was - will have to dig it up for you.

lele
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Chameleon Help & Resource Info
1.0 Nosy Be Panther Chameleon - Cyrus
0.1 Veiled Chameleon - Luna. She's now hanging from her big jungle gym in the sky
1.0 Beardie - Darwin
1.1.1 Side-blotched lizards - Ana and Stan
0.2 felines - Kyndra and Lita
0.1 African Clawed Frog - Skippy
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula - Rosa Leigh, Died 4/21/06
0.1 Goliath Bird-Eater Tarantula - Natasha, donated to science 4/4/06
?.? Pinktoe Tarantula - no name yet

There are shrublike varieties that would be feasable to prune, but like I mentioned, the little guys are just pigs. I'm still glad I have the mulberry tree as a food source though since I read somewhere that the worms fed with leaves have a higher calcium content than chow raised ones. For now I'll be using the chow until my tree matures though. Also the trees are suposed to drop thier leaves in winter, which means you still need chow part of the year, although mine still hasn't dropped it's leaves this year.(I'm in South Florida). LELE, I would be fascinated to read the article on hornworms raised on a non-toxic plant diet.

Ok, I've been researching plants in the same family(SOLANACEAE)as tomatoes and tobacco which are what hornworms normally feed on. One plant jumped out at me, petunias. Petunias are listed as non-toxic. If hornworms could survive on them it would be great since the plants are super cheap and commonly available. Even though they are listed as non-toxic to humans and reptiles, I would not want to use my guy as a guinea pig(assuming the hornworms even eat them). If you find the article on non-toxic plants for hornworms I'd appreciate it.

I discovered that hornworms do feed on petunias, in fact, they are attracted to them. It just remains to be answered if the worms will be non-toxic on this diet. Maybe I should start a new thread since I've gotten a little off topic.

any plant in the Solanaceae family are all toxic, not sure where you read petunias were OK. Have not had a chance to look for that hornworm article - I JUST read it - but will look tonight. Just stuck a note on my monitor so I don't forget
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Chameleon Help & Resource Info
1.0 Nosy Be Panther Chameleon - Cyrus
0.1 Veiled Chameleon - Luna. She's now hanging from her big jungle gym in the sky
1.0 Beardie - Darwin
1.1.1 Side-blotched lizards - Ana and Stan
0.2 felines - Kyndra and Lita
0.1 African Clawed Frog - Skippy
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula - Rosa Leigh, Died 4/21/06
0.1 Goliath Bird-Eater Tarantula - Natasha, donated to science 4/4/06
?.? Pinktoe Tarantula - no name yet

Reptile non-toxic plant list
http://www.anapsid.org/resources/edible.html

Poisonous and non-poisonous plant list
http://www.poison.org/prevent/plants.asp

According to my encyclopedia, the Solanaceae family includes more than 2,800 species, many of which are edible, while others are poisonous (some have both edible and toxic parts, like the tomato).

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Chameleon Help & Resource Info
1.0 Nosy Be Panther Chameleon - Cyrus
0.1 Veiled Chameleon - Luna. She's now hanging from her big jungle gym in the sky
1.0 Beardie - Darwin
1.1.1 Side-blotched lizards - Ana and Stan
0.2 felines - Kyndra and Lita
0.1 African Clawed Frog - Skippy
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula - Rosa Leigh, Died 4/21/06
0.1 Goliath Bird-Eater Tarantula - Natasha, donated to science 4/4/06
?.? Pinktoe Tarantula - no name yet