Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I thought I might share some personal insight on the subject of chameleon tongue problems, namely the inability to shoot at prey correctly.

I am not a herpetologist or vet, just an experienced keeper/breeder (10 yrs.) who has made some observations that may or may not help some of you whose chams are having similar problems.

I have a 2 year old gorgeous male Jackson's, who is in perfect health. However, for about 6 months or so, he has not been able to shoot at prey with his tongue effectively. I say he's in perfect health because I have come to theorize that this problem is not physical or medical, but behavioral.

This all started when he had a temporal gland infection. He initially got to where he could only shoot his tongue out about 1 inch, desperatley trying to catch prey to no avail. After taking him to my ARAV Vet, she prescribed oral Baytril for 3 weeks, and it cleared up the infection wonderfully.

But, the tongue problem persisted. In the early stages of this tongue problem, I hand-fed him frequently, simply holding prey in front of his face. He would eagerly take them and stayed quite healthy. Every time I fed him I would try to get him to catch prey naturally, but he wouldn't be able to. The tongue would come out about an inch or two and no matter how hard he seemed to try, he couldn't get any distance or accuracy.

After extensive research and little findings, I figured this problem was caused by nutrition, either a deficiency or an overdose of something. This seemed to be the consensus by the experts.

I was very confused as to how this could be the problem, since I had always done things right since I got him at 4 mos. of age. It was always food every other day, calcium twice a week, vitamins once every week and a half or so. I was using Herptivite and Rep-Cal with D3. The crix were gutloaded with the ESU "gutload" (which I since found out is terrible, but I don't think it was so horrible that it would make his tongue not work).

So, in thinking I was missing something, and not giving him something he needed, I purchased the highest quality supps. I could fing. After looking around a bit, I bought some Walkabout farms Montane Radiance Dust and cricket gutload, stuff apparently so good they only sell to zoos now.

After a very normal supplementation/feeding regimen with this stuff for 2 months, no change whatsoever.

So, I thought ok, maybe there is an overdose going on somewhere. So, I stopped ALL supplementation for two months, and only fed him gutloaded crix. Still no change.

But this point, I was very confused. How could this problem be supplement-related? I had followed all the rules, and then some, and he was still unable to shoot at prey effectively.

So, I just waited, and kept using the high quality stuff on a very normal, reasonable schedule. Things only got a little better. He would catch a cricket the normal way maybe once every third feeding or so, and never more than one this way.

Now here's where I started noticing things that made me think this problem is behavioral. Every time I released crickets into the cage, he would approach one, take aim, and the first tongue "shot" was almost full-length. Sometimes he scored, sometimes he missed. Almost like he was "trying harder out of sheer excitement". But always, after the first shot, he would chase the cricket, trying to shoot at it, only to have his tongue come out an inch or so. Sometimes he would run one down and grab it, but most of the time I would have to hold the cricket up to his head so he coud grab it.

So, here are my final thoughts: If this is a nutritional problem, why the occasional full-length shot, only at the 1st circket? Why is he healthy as a horse in every other way? Why did more supplementation not work? Why did ZERO suplementation not work?

My theory - he's gotten lazy. I know this sounds crazy, but I think what happened is that the temporal gland infection caused some kind of pain or paralysis, causing him to lose tongue ability. As I kept hand-feeding him, he got used to it, and got to where he didn't need to use his tongue. It was a cycle - he couldn't use his tongue, so I had fed him, and hand feeding him kept him from using his tongue. What I SHOULD have done, was FORCE him to try, over and over again, until his tongue was strong again. But now he is conditioned to either hand-feeding or running down prey and grabbing it.

I know his tongue works, because he shoots it out just fine every now and then, and catches the occasional prey item like normal. But he has grown used to not using it like he should, so he doesn't really try. Either the muscle condition had deterioted from non-use, or there he is just lazy and not used to having to shoot so far.

The moral of this story: BE CAREFUL WITH HAND FEEDING! MAKE YOUR CHAM USE ITS TONGUE! THAT'S WHAT IT'S FOR!

I would love some of you experts to give me some opinions or feedback here. Like I said, these are just my humble observations.

thanks
Gary

I have experienced similar events in my female veileds, but what would be the first stages of the problem you jax had. I am a very inexperienced keeper (1year, veileds only) but definetly saw a difference in the chams' hunting ability after they began hand feeding. I will make sure to let them hunt at least 40 or 50% of their food now.

Good observations, hope a vet/expert can give you some insight.

Thanks. This really seems to be a problem that most people attribute to nutrition, which I believe may be the case sometimes, but I can't help but think it can be behavioral too. One thing is for sure, there is VERY little info out there regarding this problem.

I'm going to stop all hand-feeding. I usually pinch a leg or two off a cricket so they aren't so fast, so he can grab them. From now on, I'm going to put fully-functional crickets in the cage and make him have to use his tongue to get one. Of course I won't let him starve, but I figure if he gets hungry enough, he'll remember how to use that tongue of his.

I think your dead on. Ive noticed with my two when I started hand feeding them that the same problem occured. Now I have to cup feed my female due to her cage having multiple escape routes for crickets, but let the crickets just roam in my males cage. I have noticed improvement to his shooting, he seems to be getting more confident about it.

Erin
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1:1 Veileds (Gene and Aurora)
1:1 Albino Clawed Frogs (Phedre and Jos)
?? Fire belly toad (Harold)
Various cats and dogs

I think you got something there. I always thought that my cham's inability to extend her tongue over an inch to be me spoling her with hand feeding, but just shrugged it off as coincidential. so when you mention your case i noticed the similarity. I think that might just be the actual cause. You see i have this panther cham in a free range set-up, becuase she was the tamest and sweetest chameleon i have. Naturraly i interact with her more, and althoguh i do have a feeding cup for her, i hand feed her most of the time due to her extreme tame and freindly nature. let's see if more people can back this interesting finding up with more cases.

There have been moments with my veild's that I noticed the not fully extended tongue. Like you I think this is because of improper conditioning. I will take it a step further and speculate that their tongue is like a muscle that needs to be worked out, stretched, etc. If the muscle is left to atrophy, then atrophy it shall. Amazingly I have seen that "exciting" prey items like flys, grasshoppers, moths, etc. encourage full use of the tongue, they are kind of like a workout to keep your chams tongue in top shape. Try feeding some of these instead of just crickets and see if the condition improves and by what measurement if so (or if things worsen).

As you have said, the tongue is a muscle that needs work. "use it or lose it", remember? When folks post about tongue trouble, the first thing to figure out is whether it is injury (it does happen), nutrition (many cases there are big nutritional problems to correct anyway) or behavioral (the lazy tongue issue). The point should be that we suggest SEVERAL causes and eliminate them one by one. Some injuries may result in permanent tongue muscle damage and there may also be permanent damage from bad nutrition. Chams do learn things. Some learn to drink out of a pool and can learn to catch prey without much effort. I think it is important to offer captive chams flying food for this reason. Cultured houseflies and moths make great food for chams as it gives them something exciting to hunt. Crix are sometimes too easy...easy for the keeper and easy for the cham.

All great points. Thanks for your input, as always.

I just purchased a field sweep net for instects, and this weekend I'm going to go to a good pesticide free grassy area I know of and grab some prey items that might really get him going. Maybe some green grasshoppers or katydids. Unfortunately, since the cage I'm using has 1/2" PVC coated wire, flying insects are out of the question. But I figure forcing him to hunt fully-functionally insects (with all legs attached) and even some all-new prey items that really excite him will get him back to normal tongue use. One thing is for sure, no more hand-feeding unless absolutely neccessary.

I don't think you have to totally stop hand feeding. It is such a good way to keep a cham trusting you to give hand treats. Just don't offer most or all of his food by hand. I find that having a few flying insects in the cage during the day helps a lot to keep things interesting.

i have noticed this too. i was out of crix for 4 days and hand fed meal worms. i got used to this routine and enjoyed watching him eat from my fingers. i soon noticed that his accuracy and how far his tounge would shoot out started decreasing. i was really busy for a week or two and started throwing them in the cup again. i noticed that his tounge went back to normal. in summary: 2 weeks of hand feeding limited his use of his tounge, in about another week everything went back to normal. this is a very interesing topic and i would be very interested to see a professional oppionion.

-jonathan colton

I HAVE to handfeed my 2 year old veiled because she only has one eye and does not have full ability to aim right. She has no problems taking the food from me, she is always so eager to eat!
However when I do occasionally give her the chance to hunt some down, she still goes right after them and will still use her tongue like normal (sometimes actually getting the food too!). She has always been a strong one so i am pretty fortunate. Even with the loss of her eye (long sad story) she has never turned away from food or shown any signs of stress. she is still so cute with her one eye!