Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a pair of jacksons m/f....the female eats very little maybe 1 or 2 mealworms a day..when i offerher more she just walks away...the male eats a little more maybe 3-4...they refuse to eat crickets at all..the male is blind in one eye so he has a problem hunting so i feed him from a shallow cup or by hand...the female isnt hunting too much either so i am forced to feed her from the cup as well....my other problm is it seems the male sleeps way too much..90% of the day he is sleeping while the female walks around. if i pick the male up he falls asleep in my hand...what do i do

ummm..doesn't sound so good...you'll probably need a vet...your jackson's should be VERY active...constantly exploring...you'll need to tell us how these two are set up...cage size, temp, lighting, are you keeping them together???...mealworms are not the greatest staple food and a couple of mealworms is not enough food.

My Female Jacksons have never been very active. They tend to sit on their favorite branches and not move as much as my Panthers and Veileds do.

How old are these jacksons?
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Raf

1.2 Jacksons Adults (Frank, Patty, Lucille)
0.0.1 Jackson's baby (George, R.I.P. 11/17/2003)
1.1 Nosy Be's (Mars and Roja)
1.1 Veiled - No Names Yet
0.1 Adult Sulcatta (POOPIE,I bought it from Victor at Kobey's in SD)
0.0.2 Baby Sulcattas (frick and frack)
1.0 Home's Hingeback Tortoise (SPEEDY, From Victor as well)
1.2 Red ear slider babies (Hingis, Dingis and Dorkus)
0.0.1 3 toed box turtle - No Name Yet
0.0.1 Gulf Coast Box Turtle - No Name Yet
1.0 Red Siberian Husky (Harley)
0.1 Black Lab (Krissy)
0.1 English Bulldog (Alice)
0.1 Blue Merle Great Dane (Wednesday)
Saltwater Fish and Inverts too

Yeah, unfortunately your Chameleons are sick. Closed eyes during daylight hours is a big red flag. Chameleons never sleep during the day for extended periods unless they are sick. They will move around regularly also. Maybe not all day, but if they NEVER move, then there's a problem. And no, mealworms are not a good staple food.

Please describe your setup/conditions in detail so we can tell you what to do.

Can you give us your housing size details? Are they in the same cage? How old are they? Do you drip for watering? Do you mist? What kind of lighting do you use? How long have you had these chams? What are the temperatures in the room? Do you feed every day?

Not all jacksons are super active - we have between 35-60 most of the time, and they can sit still for hours. The males and females will "hunt" if hungry. Females slow down on food consumption right before dropping babies.

If you can give some answers, we can speculate as to what might be happening with your pair.
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i do not know the exact dementions of my cage but its rather large...they are housed together...i have had them for a little over a week now...i was told they are around 4 months old...the female sits in one spot alot like the male but she dosnt sleep...i have a dripper and a mist the cage for their water...it is about 75-85 degrees...85 is a rarity and at night it drops down to about 70-75...i have maybe 30-50% humidity...i have been giving them waxworms as well becasue i heard they are more fatty and was hoping this would help them not starve but they rarely eat them...i dust all the food with vitamin powder and feed the mealies with gut load

What kind of UV bulbs are you using, and how many?

85 degrees is too hot for a Jackson's. Your maximum ambient temperature should be 80 degrees. A basking spot of 85 is ok, but it should be an isolated area in the cage.

During the day i use a combo of a 100w dayglo and 75 red night lamp...at night since i live in NJ and it is very cold i leave on the red 75w night lamp

too much heat...a 65watt bulb during the day should be good..and if your room temp is in the low 70's you don't need a night bulb...please measure your enclosure

also..your enclosure should be screened (not glass) and i saw no mention of a uv light in your post

cut back to a 65w bulb. I live in PA and it's cold here too. Since they are inside (I'm assuming and hoping) you dont, and shouldnt use, a night light of any kind. They need darkness like we do for proper cycling. Be sure you are using some kind of UVB light (reptisun 5.0 or reptiglo 8.0) and cut back on your dusting of vitamins. You might be overdozing your kids with vitamins. Dust once a week. Be sure your crickets arent too big for your cham. At 6 months, they should be eating around 1/2" crickets without problems. I have 1.3 jacksons and they are in separate cages and I have them all eating the 1/2" crickets without any issues. They seem to prefer the smaller sized crix than the larger ones. If you are going to feed any worms, try the silkworms. Some chams really love them. The waxworms are NOT a good daily food. I feed mine wax worms maybe once a week as a treat and only a couple per cham.

Get your male to a vet quickly...they definitely should not fall asleep in your hand. Separate the chams too. Together, they stress out. They should really only be together when mating time or in a huge cage (i only put mine together in my outside cage in the spring or summer and I always end up with gravid females).

Hope this helps. too much heat hurts jacksons. They like cooler temps than other chams.
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Raf

1.2 Jacksons Adults (Frank, Patty, Lucille)
0.0.1 Jackson's baby (George, R.I.P. 11/17/2003)
1.1 Nosy Be's (Mars and Roja)
1.1 Veiled - No Names Yet
0.1 Adult Sulcatta (POOPIE,I bought it from Victor at Kobey's in SD)
0.0.2 Baby Sulcattas (frick and frack)
1.0 Home's Hingeback Tortoise (SPEEDY, From Victor as well)
1.2 Red ear slider babies (Hingis, Dingis and Dorkus)
0.0.1 3 toed box turtle - No Name Yet
0.0.1 Gulf Coast Box Turtle - No Name Yet
1.0 Red Siberian Husky (Harley)
0.1 Black Lab (Krissy)
0.1 English Bulldog (Alice)
0.1 Blue Merle Great Dane (Wednesday)
Saltwater Fish and Inverts too

You're doing a lot of things very wrong. (Sorry.)
1)They need to be housed separately with vuisual as well as physical isolation.
2)Get rid of the night time heat source. They can tolerate temps into the low 60s quite easily.
3)You have no UVB. But you have too much heat. The basking area should be about 85F (maybe 90) but the rest of the caghe should be in the 70s & 80s.
4)You are killing them with over-supplementation. If you're gutloading your prey properly you rarely need it. I supplement no more than once every 2-4 weeks and then with the very lightet amount possible. Most peoople I see coat the crix until they're totally white. That's waaaaay. too much.
5)You didn't say if the cage was screen or glass. Glass is very bad.
6)You didn't say how long your chams received misting and dripping. Your drippers should be going several hours/ day and your misting should be with hot water and should last for many minutes. One of the reasons that glass tanks are so bad is that it's virtually impossible to give them adequate hydration with flooding the tank. I use at least a gallon/cham/day. Glass cages also turn into ee-Z Bake ovens with the wattage you've mentioned. And those cheap, pet store thermometers are completely inadequate. You need a good electronic thermometer (with a probe) to get accurate readings.
Ed

There isnt really too much heat at all...with both going it is 80 degrees...right now is even a little less then 80...it only goes above 80 when the house heater is high...i do have a screen cage as well and the dealer i bought them from had them all living together...multiple males and females in a smaller cage...they sleep next to each other somtimes and there is no puffing up or hissing going on...the 100w day light is a uv lamp...if i dont have the night lamp on at night they will certainly die...it gets sub 60s in my room at times becasue of drafty windows and doors...they sleep fine with the night lamp on

ummm..there is no such thing...that's a heat lamp..it does not give off uv rays...sounds like you've been petco'd

Says on the box Stimulates natural behavior through UV rays...so this means it is not a UV lamp???

my nightlight is 60 not 75..... my bad

You need to get a few 15" Reptisun 5.0 UV flourescent bulbs ASAP.
The 100 heat lamp is pretty worthless. True UV light is critical for digestion and metabolization. Without it, your Jackson's aren't digesting any food, or metabolizing it, or growing, or anything. Get as much UV light on them as you can as soon as you can. And use maybe one heat lamp (75w) on them during the day to create a 90 degree or so basking spot and that's it. No heat needed at night. They actually need a pretty dramatic temperature drop (15-20 degrees) at night.

I once had a Jackson's in college who survived FREEZING temperatures one night when the heat went out! He was fine the next day! So, 60s ad 50s are completely tolerable. Remember, Jackson's are a mountain species. Too much heat will kill them fast.

One more thing:

As far as housing, NEVER follow any example you see in a pet store. Most pet store employees don't give a crap about meeting the specific needs of chameleons. Chameleons are simply inventory to them. They want to sell them, make money and get more to sell. They are only concerned with keeping them alive long enough to sell them to anyone who has money.

I once saw a pet store display with a Jackson's housed in a 10 gallon tank, with a little pebble beach leading into a pool of filthy water four inches deep, a regular daylight incandescent bulb, about 50 crickets running around, about 20 dead crickets, and I think a rock or log for climbing. It made my blood boil. Follow the advice of vets, zoologists and scientists, or at least very experinced herpers. Most pet store employees are idiots when it comes to Chameleons. Read as much as you can about them from credible sources.

ugh...petland discounts has a male veiled in a 10 gallon tank..makes me sooo mad

Didnt get em at a pet store...got them from a dealer at a reptile expo

There are tw things that the breeder might have done.
1: Only done it for the show which is at least somewhat understandable knowI wpould rather thake 1 cage for some little 4 month olds than tak all their normal cages.
2: He was a bad breeder or kept them together longer than most people d they are usually seperated by 3 months.

What is the name and brand of the bulb? T-Rex (active UV) and Zoomed (powersun UV) are the 2 most common MV bulbs availible in petstores, so if it is one of these, then it is a MV bulb. If it is a Mercury vapor bulb, then yes it does give off UV and a lot more than any tubes can. If this is so, you don't have to worry about UV, but if it is a normal incandesent bulb, then you need an additional source of UV. If you need more UV(if it isn't a mercury vapor bulb) then I would recomend a tube for Jackson's because of their needs for lower temps and higher humidities, this is just a little harder to achieve with a MV bulb than a tube light.