Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i'm having this prob with my cham, he seems to want to bit me, everytime i go into his cage, i've been trying to hand feed him silkworms and crickets, silky's moreso, he is reluctant to take food from me, but if i set it near him , he will go right after it and eat it, i know they dontlike to be handles, but it makes moving him and cleaning his cage, or taking him outside, difficult as i dotn want to stress him any more than he already is, any sugggestions?

Thnaks, DAve

get some work gloves at home depot.

How big is your chameleon? If he's not too big, let him bite you. I know that sounds like bad advice, but (this is my opinion, nothing to substantiate it) sometimes chameleons act like they're going to bite, but have no intention to do so. Passive aggressive behavior, only not so passive. Once they get a response from you (you back off when they act grouchy), their behavior has been reenforced with a reward (they get left alone).
Get some gloves if you've got a low pain threshhold. Do what you have to do, but don't let him intimidate you. Ignore his warnings while you do your chores.
I'm not saying to totally ignore his wishes to be left alone. All I'm saying is don't let him intimidate you while you're doing what you have to do.
Hope I was helpful.
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Victor Gomez
gomezvi.tripod.com/sdchamkeepers/
gomezvi@yahoo.com

I agree with Victor. I had my cham when he was 5 weeks old, and I let him bite me a bit. If your cham is relatively small, I'd say Do it. I would let him bite me on the tip of my finger, letting him bite down on the fingernail and bottom tip of my finger. It won't hurt at all if he's small, I did this up until about 6 months ago (he's two now, and a little too big for that!) But now if I go in his cage, he'll sometimes makes the motion to bite me, but does it with a closed mouth. Definitely keep trying to hand feed him, it help passify my guy a whole lot. A quick tip: After he starts eating from your hand, and you want to get him out of the cage, put a waxworm in your hand, and when he goes to get it, slowly bring it back until he eventually walks on your other hand.

First, your cham is not an a-hole, he's just being himself and defending his space. A few tips. If he's really being a pain and you have cage chores to do you can turn his lights off before you need to do the chores. This will slow his reaction time down and have a calming effect. You could coax him onto a perch and remove him to a nice plant in a sunny window while you clean. If you have a plant already set up you can do this routinely and he will learn there is an interesting spot away from the cage to visit. Even a fake Ficus from KMart would work. As for hand feeding...chams are not Einstein. They learn slowly, so be patient. Start with a food you know he loves and move on to other types of insects later.

This post absolutely made my day.
On a positive note, all of the chams that I have kept that had aggressive attitudes always did very well. You just certainly have a very healthy chameleon that is doing his chameleon thing.

Congrats on letting a chameleon be a chameleon.

Joe