There is no way of telling when it started because at some point I had many,many chams. I cant commit to saying I observed each individual cham but believe me when i say that I probably did as I am enthralled by them and thrive for the best care possible. I either missed them if they had the issue or the issue started at some point during their development. I had a huge 10 inch adult male that was in a group of about 12 that were just big from the start,grew at a rapid rate and maxed out at a very large size.In this particular group I noticed a male with the tongue issue at his large 10 inch size and my suspicion is that he developed the issue at some point and did not have it out of the egg as I always had these extra large guys separated into smaller groups and they were easy to observe. My theory is that they are injuring themselves. How? well that im not positive of but I think it could be due to shooting at the same prey and connecting tongues as I have seen them do that. One will retract and will pull the others tongue with the retracted tongue. I have seen the retracted tongue cham pull the whole other cham with him and start to chew on whatever is on the tip of his tongue which includes the other chams face! A few scratches is not a big deal but I suspect this could injure another chams tongue if they connect tongues and one retracts the other tongue forcefully. (That whole muscle system you spoke of carlton) In any case I am going to start with new breeding stock and see if the same issues arise and compare to the genetics of these I have spoke of.(Not the ones with the actual tongue issue but clutch mates that are normal) I have started yet another expansion of my cham rooms but no matter how much room a cham has if they are shooting at the same prey issues can arise. I have two of the chams with tongue issue and I am going to see if they ever get over their problem, however, I have heard this is rarely the case. My other holdbacks are all separated out into individual cages and I suspect they will not have any "tongue issues' that will develop. I dont think it is a nutritional thing as I have some panther chams going on 5 years old(not breeders) and a mellers whos about 2 years. Besides you would think if it was nutritional more then 6 out of 50 something cham babies would develop similar issues but isf there is anything i have learned about rearing chams is expect the unexpected. Thanks!

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