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from the female who had eight this morning. I noticed she was still acting like she was looking for a "place" so I watched her off and on all day, as soon as I left, about two hours ago, she had two more. I will catch one in the act next time I hope. Wish I had a dig camera. By the way she acts very comfortable around me so I dont think she is waiting til Im not in there. Also she never stopped eating like Kermit did. this brings the total to 14; 10 males and four females, I think. Is this ratio common or am I probably not sexing them accurately? Also does anyone know when you can tell if baby jax are red phase?

by the way the two babies were very near the mom so I'm sure it happened in the last two hours, they start dispersing as soon as they are born.

Congrats on the babies.

My jacksons clutch was 12, so I'm willing bet that right around there is normal.

Did you or will you seperate them?
I found that seperating them helped with feeding. (Making sure that they all were eating and had enough)

Just curious though, I know people that move them all into one place, and also seperate them into individual containers.

Let me know if I can help out with anything.
Joe

I have a book that says Jackson's have beetween 8 and 35 babies per litter, so I'm guessing 12 to 14 would be about average. 8 to 35 seems like a wide range, but it also says they have one larger litter around June and a smaller one around December. If this was your cham's first litter this year for either of you, you might expect a few more babies in another 5 or 6 months.

Thanks for the info. My Jax was young, probably about 2 years. So, I imagine that my small clutch size was due to her age. I'd like to know if anyone out there has had more per clutch, and how old the female was. It'd be interesting to know the "peak" breeding age. Although, it wouldn't allow for many health variables.. Just would be interesting.
Joe

fascinating, never read that info about the different sized litters, what book is that??

It's called The Chameleon Handbook. It's published by Barron's Educational Series, Inc.

love is like oxygen

I plan to keep them all in a very large outside screen cage until it becomes neccessary to seperate them. I don't forsee any problems with the females staying together indefinately, as long as they have plenty of food and space, the males I am going to have to wait and see. I also plan to keep as many as I can in the greenhouse as soon as they are too big for the phelsuma to eat. I have tempted each female chameleon every day with a new juicy baby. They seem very interested at first, then ignore them. I do not think they will eat them, but will not take that chance yet. Dern, I think I have 12 males now and five female (just found three more) so I will definately have to have individual cages for the males most likely, perhaps if they are raised together they will get along til they are older..... hmmmmmmmmmmmmm I love it. I have world enough and time to do whatever it takes, of course i willkeep posting.

I dont think eat the babies is a common thing with jackson females....im not sure about males though you might to try and see if a male will try to eat a kid,just take the baby away before it does happin.

also if you have a wood pile in your back yard somewhere you can give the babies turmites,i heard they are better that pinheads but i found that my new baby anoles can really pack them down becuase the tumites bobies are extremly soft.

grasshoppers are good food try the greens ones though.

oh sexing usually is possitive until 4 months thats when horns start and color changes begen at 3 months but usually hard to see any difference until 4-5 months

Can't believe i didn't even think to see if the male would eat one, DUH. That's what is great about this forum, ya get alot from the bouncing about of ideas. Termites is a great idea, thanks alot for that one too, I could find them year round here. But I still cannot find what the normal gender ratio of Jackson's is. Thanks again, you are great.

a

At the moment I have them all 17 in a small bird cage covered with screen and filled with asperagus fern fronds (tiny leaves and lots of small branches) with a small halogen on them. I keep the cage in the greenhouse about half the day and open the door to their cage to let in fruit flies. I have a puddle of tropical delight baby food in a jar lid in the bottom of their cage and there are zillions of fruit flies in the greenhouse so they swarm to the baby food, then I close the door. I have observed almost all to them catching ff. They shoot short of their target ALOT at first. The type of fruit fly I use seem small for them but many small meals are better than one large one,like a house fly, but I can already see I will need larger food very soon.