No Marvin Gaye needed...

No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Tue Feb 05, 2013 9:10 am

Hi Everyone,

A few weeks ago my Female Veiled ended up on top of my Male's Terrarium. She hissed, gasped and became very very dark. This was actually quite by accident that she ended up there but then i now knew she was not ready. I did a lot of research on the coloration of a female when she is ready to mate and believe me there are not a lot of writing on the subject. Every blog/forum and electronic literature mentions this part of the breeding process but in little detail and most of them mentioned that "you introduce your female to your male, if she is ready .... However there must be a Science to this right? So I decided to document these subtle changes to get more clarity on the matter. However i will have to do this whole process again and confirm results in order to safely say that it is accurate.

For now i am so amped to know she mated and would be expecting a nice big clutch soon! I have so many things to get ready though but I'm excited.
Here's a few pics i took with my BB last night, I know they are bad quality sorry :smt021 Haha.

IMG-20130204-00317.jpg


IMG-20130204-00344.jpg


Vanderbijlpark-20130205-00348.jpg


No my question, I know they say that when the female rejects the male the you have to remove her as she is done mating. Also they mention this could take a few hours to longer than that. But it leaves me with a dilemma of will she take if i remove her sooner or should i check up on them every few hours?
I work far from home so in this case its hard to get there quick and every two hours or so. Hopefully ill figure something out (IP CAMERA?)

But The great news is that they accepted each other and Mated! now the hard work starts!!

Super amped and keen!! ;)
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby insaniac » Tue Feb 05, 2013 1:10 pm

I don't reckon an afternoon together after mating is completed will impede anything...

Just remove her when you get home and she's "running away" from the male.

Keep us updated with mom's growth if she took.

Good Luck !
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby Chamssss » Tue Feb 05, 2013 2:56 pm

There are actually plenty of articles on forums, videos on youtube and descriptions in books on both male and female veileds receptive and unreceptive physical and colour responses to breeding.

Receptive females are lime green with scattered robin egg blue spots all over their body with a few pumpkin coloured spots in random patches. Don't leave your chameleons at home breeding while you aren't there, they could show signs of agression towards each other and will hurt each other in the process, males often bite and head butt females that lose their 'submissiveness' while/after mating.

The mating is complete when your female tries to get loose from the male and goes pitch black with the blue and pumpkin spots becoming more prominent on the black background. Remove her immediately once this happens or your male could get injured. Then try again the following day, if she shows no signs of agression and remains lime green with the spots then put her in for round 2, if she shows the dark colours accompanied with mouth gaping and hissing upon the males approach then take her out and start treating your female as gravid and 30-60 days later you should have eggs. Good luck
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Tue Feb 05, 2013 3:29 pm

Hi Camssss

That's the problem, all of them say this and my Female never had the blue coloration nor the yellow spots, The only way was to actually try introduce them on a bi-weekly manner. Ive watched the videos and read the articles that are out there but i think it might be more of an individual and behavioral prospect than actually labeling it as "this IS what happens"

I arranged someone looking after them today, I had the same idea that who knows when she rejects the male and they start being aggressive. I also don't like the idea of leaving them alone.

I will introduce her to the male on Monday again, if she does not take i will treat her as gravid, and start to look out for the coloration and behavior that is Supposed to be accompanied with a pregnant female. She however already has a laying bin in her cage so now its the wait. I decided to get me a IP cam so i can check up her at work too.

@Insaniac - I will keep you updated on the progress bud :)
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby kfc223 » Tue Feb 05, 2013 3:50 pm

Well Good luck with the breeding!

Very nice looking specimens you have there.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby insaniac » Tue Feb 05, 2013 4:28 pm

I was not aware of that Chamsss.

Question though, what happens in nature when they mate and don't get separated by human hand ?

Do a lot of wild male chameleons then end up with injured reproductive organs ???

I don't mean to sound snotty, just curious ?...
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby Chamssss » Tue Feb 05, 2013 10:33 pm

Well I've witnessed male veileds head butting females till they fall to the ground so I'd imagine the chameleon will fall from its position and that's how they separate.
And I have seen females bite males faces from getting too close when unreceptive. After being bitten the male will usually shy away but why risk letting your male possibly losing an eye? I wouldn't say that the chameleons sexual organs will be injured but they will certainly have visible injuries like bite marks to the face and forelimbs, and the female will have many scratches all over her body. I'm pretty sure Ainslie has noticed this on his famale, all the black scratches? Those will take atleast 2 weeks to start fading.

Your forgetting these chameleons are enclosed where as in the wild, they are not. I'm not talking nonsense if that is what you are thinking, watch a pair of veileds mate, there's nothing romantic about it XD an american breeder left his monstrous male with a female for too long and when he returned he found the female dangling half dead from the males mouth.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby Chameleon Company » Wed Feb 06, 2013 6:44 am

@ AinslieZA

Good day, when did the mating start and how long have the chameleons been together.

Your female is definitely big enough to produce eggs, keep her warm now with an increase in feeding and calcium with D3.

You also need to provide natural sunlight as females that roduce under artificial UVB tend to weaken.

I see you are in Vanderbijlpark, I live here too (well not really anymore but am here weekly).
2:2 Pseudaspis cana
1:2 Dasypeltis scabra

And yes they are all on permit.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby insaniac » Wed Feb 06, 2013 7:34 am

@ Chamsss :

Like I said, I was just curious...

Thanks anyway for the explanation.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Wed Feb 06, 2013 8:20 am

Chameleon Company wrote:@ AinslieZA

Good day, when did the mating start and how long have the chameleons been together.

Your female is definitely big enough to produce eggs, keep her warm now with an increase in feeding and calcium with D3.

You also need to provide natural sunlight as females that roduce under artificial UVB tend to weaken.

I see you are in Vanderbijlpark, I live here too (well not really anymore but am here weekly).


Hi Chameleon Company

The Mating started Monday afternoon and continued Tuesday for most of the day. She is removed from the Male's enclosure and back in her own.
At this moment I'm waiting for the Gravid coloration to show as I'm not sure that she "took" Like Camsss said above that all i can do is to treat her as if she is.

Wish i could say I'm here only once a week haha. ... :smt012 Do you work here now?
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby Chameleon Company » Thu Feb 07, 2013 8:44 am

Ok, I would introduce her to the male daily.... They will either keep breeding or the female will be unreceptive (dark background colour with yellow and turqoise dots) so its a good indicator if she is gravid or not. They usually mate for around 3 - 5 days before the female is unreceptive.

Keep her drinking well, they have massive clutches that require lots of moisture. Its good to see that veileds are still being bred.... They recently went through quite a dip in the pet trade availability.

Did you buy these veileds in the Vaal? it a good chance they where offspring from my facility.... I use to supply the Vaal with all their chams.

Hahahahahahaha yeah the good old Vaal, no I live in JHB but my mother still lives in Vanderbijlpark so I come here for the never ending supply of beer!
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And yes they are all on permit.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Thu Feb 07, 2013 9:03 am

Hi Chameleon Company
Yeah my plan is to introduce them over the weekend again to see, this way I'm available to check up on them. She is very reluctant to drink these days, i use ice and also a dripper. She however has a huge appetite. I would feed her and a few hours later she would be back to her feeding sop with her head in the bowl looking for food. haha

My plan is to breed these beautiful Chameleons here in the vaal. I got them from a forum member in edenvale, but my third male (2 months old) i got from a local pet-shop.

What high school did you attend?

Do you still breed?
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby Chameleon Company » Thu Feb 07, 2013 9:15 am

Yeah over the weekend is safest when you can keep an eye on them, veileds are notoriously known to inflict pretty serious wounds if unreceptive and last thing you want is an injured male. Drippers are good, ice cubes they rarely drink from because the water dripping is very cold.

Keep her well fed, but not too much due to compaction. Roughly 10 large crickets a day for a gravid female is ideal, of course lightly dusted with a good quality calcium like Exo-terra, T-rex Bone Aid or Zoo-med Repti-vite.

Do your chameleons receive unfiltered natural sunlight or are the purely reliant on artificail UVB tubes?

I was in Sasol High, matric '06. We probably bump into each other at Rafters from time to time haha.

I stopped breeding about 2 years ago, sold everything chameleon related because it was too much work (me being a student) and the market was flooding with an excess of veileds, not so much panthers and the other species. Plus moving to CPT and the permit system is strict so I will breed again, but will get my stock on permit in the Western Cape instead of importing all my stock through provinces.
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And yes they are all on permit.
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Thu Feb 07, 2013 12:21 pm

They receive about 10+ hours Unfiltered sunlight a Week, I have them outside on weekends and some week days as well. The rest of the time they have UVB 5.0 lights running with their basking lights. She eats about that amount a day but i vary her diet between Crickets, mealworms, super worms and roaches. I dust them every other day as not to give her too much calcium and D3

She almost never drinks from either, I check her excrement for signs of dehydration but all is perfect, i assume that she gets enough water in as i breed my own feeders and keep them well hydrated and very well fed. It has been worrying me for a while now but I'm pretty attentive to this and will quickly pick up if there is a problem. I read a thread on dehydrating veileds a while back and there are quite a few ways to try if one fails.

I went to Transvaila, Matric '04. We probably have bumped in to each other at Rafterz, I'm almost constantly there for rehearsals. You should let me know when you go there again.

Always wondered why the cape is so strict on these matters, is it due to the Favorable environment?
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Re: No Marvin Gaye needed...

Postby AinslieZA » Mon Oct 14, 2013 11:46 am

Hey guys, Its been quite some time since ive been on here but I can give a Update on the above.

I have successfully Bred my Veiled! :)
As you can see on the Original post they Mated on the 5th Of feb and my Female laid her Clutch around the 3rd or 4 th of March. And this weekend they started to Hatch.

Currently all of the eggs have hatched successfully. Of the clutch laid (40) 37 of the Clutch were healthy for the 7 months they were incubating. At this moment 28 have hatched over the past 3 days and the rest will hatch within the next 2 days or so and I'm not foreseeing any problems as they look very healthy.

My Incubator consisted of a Tank I got from the Expo, 4 bricks, 2 plastic containers with the eggs and a Aquarium heater. I filled the tank with Water and covered the plastic containers with eggs with lids bigger than the container itself. The eggs were put in with Vermiculite as usual and kept at a temp of around 24 - 26 degrees.

I believe this worked quite well as according to the references this can take up to the year if the environment is not suitable.

See below image of the little fellas, Fell in love with them! :smt007

Repies.jpg
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