Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a very active Jackson's that loves climbing around his cage, the problem is, I believe he is hurting his nails when he does it. His cage which is a screen enclosure that I have posed below seems to be a great cage so I don't know why it would be hurting his nails. His nails seem to have fallen out on one foot and also seem missing from another. Any ideas? The picture below is before I have installed a digital therm/humid and a misting system.

I think the problem is occuring because the holes of the screen are to narrow in comparason to your jacksonii nails, concluding in nails been damages or broken off the foot.

>>I have a very active Jackson's that loves climbing around his cage, the problem is, I believe he is hurting his nails when he does it. His cage which is a screen enclosure that I have posed below seems to be a great cage so I don't know why it would be hurting his nails. His nails seem to have fallen out on one foot and also seem missing from another. Any ideas? The picture below is before I have installed a digital therm/humid and a misting system.
>>
-----
-Jamie Whitehouse
-corn_snake_123@msn.com
-formally known as corn_snake_123

Your chameleon clamps onto the screen, and sometimes the nails will get caught in the screen. When the chameleon moves on, he'll loosen and somethimes pull the nail right out.

I have a chameleon that is prone to roaming the screen of his enclosure..

So, what I did:
I took nylon clothesline, and tied 2 1/2 ft sections down from the top all the way around the enclosure. (This is hard to describe) So, the clothesline looks like prison bars all around the cage spaced about 2 inches apart. When the chameleon is climbing, he will prefer the hanging clothesline to the side of the cage and will stop clamping on to the screening.

This will solve the missing toenails, but you now have another maintenance issue. You have to replace your rope when it becomes soiled and/or becomes discolored (The nylon rope will trap water and breed bacteria)

I simply prepare "extra" rope setups, and clip them in there when I do a cage cleaning.

*note: I don't have this setup on all of my cages. With most chameleons, they will stay within the plants if your enclosure is well planted.

**note: You can also use larger spaced screening to stop nails from being pulled. Free roaming feeders will easily escape through larger screening.

What size is you cage? From the picture it looks very small. I used to have mine in a 16x16x25 cage. He climbed the screen all the time. I then moved him to a 24x24x36 and he climbed occasionally. I then added more upper area walkways and a ficus to climb in and he stopped all together.

I see the pathos (or it almost looks like philo) in there. Those are not that great for climbing, but do keep humidity in rather well.

I dont belive they like to climb the screen, but if we dont provide an alternative, well, they will.

I can show you a pic of my enclosure if you want to see it.

I am trying to hang mesh on the inside of the alum. but want to do it in such a way that it is removable.

jacksons like the ficus trees and creeping ficus much more than a potho beuase potho vines and leave are too close to gether and they can really climb in them...if you give him eno0ugh branches in the cage that allow him to go most of the cage he will use those more than the screen to get there.

My panther likes to hang from the roof of her cage... Sometimes she'll even sleep like that. lol.
My cage has two layers: metal screen, and a plastic 1/4" hardware cloth type of thing from the gardening section of home depot. She likes to climb on it, even though there are sticks everywhere. She did hurt one toenail on the roof, bc she only started doing that recently, so I lined it like the rest of the cage, and now she's ok.