Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello; new to the forum and somewhat new to chameleons; I've been raising them since last September, and no one I've spoken to has had this kind of problem, and I can't seem to find similar situations well-documented on the internet...

My male veiled, Zuko, recently had the lower six inches of his tail amputated following a severe infection caused by an injury left untreated by his previous owner. We tried to take care of it to avoid amputation, but it was useless; his hips ossified and he got sicker, and we had to amputate the tail from the wound down. Currently, I'm giving him 0.6cc Baytrill, 0.7cc Metronidazole, and 0.15cc Aluminum Hydroxide by mouth daily to fight infection while it heals.

When we first got him home, he seemed to be doing well; his movement improved (I assume without the dead weight of his useless tail slowing him down), and the ossification in his hips hasn't totally crippled him as we expected. He can climb using all four limbs, most of the time (with the modifications we made to his enclosure), and he was traveling more quickly than he had been before for about a week.

This is week two, though, and he keeps sitting on the towel at the bottom of his cage. He's always his lighter shades; yellows and greens, whereas before he was usually brown (from the pain and aggravation of the injury, according to the doctors). These are also the colors he'd be when he was sleeping, and when I initially looked into getting him he was pictured with them, so I'm presuming they're a good sign, or an indication that he's relaxed.

But when he's not happy (whenever I have to medicate him) he remains yellow/green--Is that normal? At the vet he turned black and dark brown on one side (facing the doctor) and was green/yellow on the other (facing me), even when I was medicating him.

I've been having to force him to drink water, and I'm not sure whether he's been eating his crickets, or if they're hiding in his plant or something. I think he's been eating, but he's so lethargic that I can't tell for sure... He’s due to go back in for a recheck in a week or two (leaning towards a week from today, though), but in the meantime I’m not sure how to help him, or even if this is just part of the healing process. So, after much rambling and attempts at giving as much detail as possible, all I can really say is:

Help? Please?

~Meg

Sitting on the floor of the cage, not drinking by himself, and being lethargic are not good signs. Some meds can make them less active than normal. I would call the vet and tell him/her what is going on.

You said..."I'm not sure whether he's been eating his crickets, or if they're hiding"...is he pooping?

Do you provide UVB light for him? Gutload your insects? Supplement/dust the insects? What is the basking temperature at?

Baytril can be rough on a weakened cham, damaging kidneys and upsetting their gut. A cham on Baytril often stops eating or drinking just when it is important that they get extra water to flush the meds. He may be overmedicated (why the combination of meds?) and feeling quite sick. Or, it could be that the infection is not under control and is continuing to spread internally, or was more systemic because of his neglect. I think I would go back to the vet sooner than later. Poor little guy, good luck with him! As for the color changes, hard to say. Brown is a sign of being cold or SEVERELY stressed. I've seen chams on Baytril sit quiet and brownish rather than show their normal color. Yellow and green are more normal, but milder stress will tend to show as more intense shades of these colors with darkened borders around the stripes. Chams can change color on just one side in response to a threat, to heat or cold. When a cham basks and turns one side to the heat, at first they can turn the exposed side dark to speed up the heat absorption.