He doesn't got a name again

It was Ignatius. Didn't take.

Crickets

I thought I'd feel like Vlad The Impaler, throwing live insects to a strange death every day. I thought my childhood love of The Cricket In Times Square (they don't hand out The Newbery to just anyone) would make me squeamish about sacrificing crickets to the Great Tongue. I thought it'd take some getting used to.

But then you bring them home and they rustle around making soft, horrible sounds, and they climb all over each other like the maggot/rice from The Lost Boys, and behave so loathsomely that you don't feel bad about chucking them into the ring to face the lions. Circle of life and all that.

The first night The Lizard came home, I had a tupperware container filled with crickets, egg carton pieces for them to hide in, and a whole lot of cricket food (looks like smaller dog food. who knew?). The problem with a tupperware container the size of a brownie pan filled with hopping insects is that there isn't a really easy way to open it up and get the few crickets you need. Attempting to prepare the little guy's first meal in his new home resulted in seven rogue crickets hopping around our kitchen (thanks for helping with the round-up, Trent).

I have since purchased something called The Kricket Keeper which is a clear plastic box, tall enough that the little creeps don't instantly hop out if you ever open the lid. There are two black tubes, open on the bottom and with a clear plastic lid on the top, which fit perfectly into two holes in the lid. Crickets, like evil people, prefer to live in dark tubes and so the moment they are in the box most of them crawl up into one of the tubes. The view through the clear lid down into the tube does not inspire.
All right, so a black tube can be pulled out of the lid (and a little trap door falls closed over the hole in the lid so escapees are thwarted). The right amount of crickets is easy to tap out, and then you slide the thing back in. So easy, and you don't have to lay a finger on one filthy cricket.


Did I mention that they cannibalize one another? They cannibalize one another.

They go from the kricket keeper into a tall plastic cup (so they can't hop out), where you dump vitamin powder all over them and shake them up till they are coated. Next stop is the cage floor. They aren't there for long.
Chameleons don't, as a rule, overeat. This means that it is conceivable that you may end up dumping more crickets in the cage than the little guy is going to eat. Further proof of their despicableness... any uneaten crickets must be removed from the cage before night falls, as they will torment and bite the sluggish and cold chameleon all night long. Nasty-minded insects and delicate geniuses don't mix.

Touchy Feely

Check this quotation from a Chameleon Message Board.


Chameleons should be regarded as strictly “look but do not touch” animals. Some, such as veiled chameleons are typically quite aggressive and can give a painful (although rarely very injurious) bite. Others rarely bite. Nevertheless, chameleons are solitary animals and handling is invariably stressful. Constant handling is a stressor that evokes the secretion of various hormones that, among other things, inhibit the body’s immune system. The result can be a dramatically shortened lifespan.

*sigh...

He's ready for his close-up, Mr. Demille

Until my wife and I watched Sunset Boulevard last week, I had no idea how creepy the original context of that famous line is. Anyway, a better camera came to visit, and here's a few snaps of the little gaffer.

He's got a name

but we're not saying anything about it till we try it out for a day or so. We were quite sure about Jack last week, but it didn't stick to the little man.

Discarded Names

• Augustus
• Banjo
• Benedict
• Dylan
• Eliot
• Elvis
• Gadget
  
• Jack
• John-Paul the Third
• Ken
• Kenneth
• Louis
• LunchBox
• Pascal
• Sonny
• Tango

When He grows up

He'll look something like this. Unbelievagable.

His Various Charms

His Crazy Feet- Make the Spock sign with your hands. That's what his toes are like. 3 fingers fused together on one side, 2 on the other- they look like muppet alien hands, and they stick to things and grab things and move all around.

His Disgusting, Amazing Feeding Spectacle- Rocket Tongue! As recorded in this random pic my wife found online! Disgusting! Amazing!


His Monkey Tail- He grabs stuff with it, hangs from it, stands on it when he's aiming for a cricket (Disgusting! Amazing!), and when he sleeps he curls it up into a perfect spiral like a spring fiddlehead.

His Swivelling Eyes- Both eyes are mounted on these bulging telescope cones that move around independently. He'll look at me behind him and my wife in front of him at the same time. The eyes are the windows to the chameleon soul apparently. If he's dehydrated the cones will sink into his head, apparently. If you use the wrong kind of light bulb it might damage the delicate genius' eyesight apparently. If he looks like he's sleeping in the daytime when his lamps are still on, eyes closed and still, there's probably something very, very wrong with him, apparently. They move around all day, almost never fixed on the same thing at the same time. Swivel, swivel, swivel, swivel.

He Loves The Bangles- He walks like an egyptian.

Still Nameless

Grace

These are some of the things we did right, even though I had no idea what I was doing.

***

1. I accidentally bought the animal from a good breeder. Basically anything we've done right since the little man came home is because of accidentally doing this. Pet stores are often not keeping chameleons in the right environment- and you learn pretty quick that these things are like spoiled rich kids- they get what they want or they get sick and they die. Apparently it's easy to unknowingly buy an imported chameleon that was caught in the wild, and the chance of you bringing home filth and disease goes through the roof then. I wandered in to a place where this groovy guy has been breeding reptiles for 15 years. He was respectful of his animals; they were clean and fed; and now that I know a little more I can see that they were well kept. He was also a smart breeder, bringing fresh blood into his gene-pools, keeping it clean, selecting for good traits. Quality lizard guy, I think so far. I have no more idea of how to find a good lizard breeder than you do, but here you can find a gateway to all kinds of chameleon resources. Just don't do what I did. Do your homework first and not after. We got lucky.

2. I accidentally put the lizard in a good environment. Quiet room, right size cage, right shape cage, right cage decoration, proper lamps. My Lizard Guy set me up with all the bits and pieces and strange powders and cricket foods and etcetera.

3. We gave the little guy a low-stress homecoming. Well, this is a lie. We overhandled him, as I said, on the first night, but after that, my wife and I just naturally backed off, and left him alone for the next couple days, except for his care. Lizard Guy told me that everything is great with this animal if you always remember to respect this animal. I learned a few fun tricks. These guys live in trees, and they feel safest when they are higher up in the tree than any visible potential marauders. So, if you keep your head below his eye level, he's a much more relaxed chameleon.

4. I started reading about Veiled Chameleon Care from multiple sources. I'm an idiot. I did this after I brought the thing home. You do this before.

***

Get a load of me pontificating on chameleon care. Four days ago my entire life was utterly without chameleons. I'm no expert, I'm just trying to take a snapshot of us figuring it out as we go along... Really, I'm just trying not to kill the chameleon.