Wednesday, November 18, 2009

News from the incubator!!

Something incredible has happened in our incubator.

Two itsby bitsy teeny weeny baby veiled chameleons fought their way out of their respective egg.

I know you want pictures.

Here's a shot of the deli dish in the incubator. This is the second chameleon battling his way out of his egg. It took each baby over a day to get free of the egg. The first was completely out on Saturday; the second yesterday.

Here's a closer-up shot of the photo above. For the first day or so, the chameleon drags around, from it's tummy, a little ball of egg material. I think it serves as nutrition, but it sure trips up the baby a lot. The little ball shrivels up after a day or two. In this picture, you can see that the baby's has some vermiculite (dirt stuff we put in each deli dish) stuck to him.

Here are the two babies. It's a sibling photo. They're hanging from the top of their cage, bonding and perhaps wondering if any additional brothers or sisters will be showing up. This lighting is not showing up their colors. However, the baby born on Saturday is much greener than the more recent baby, who is a boring brown.

Ahhh.....

You can how they're very cute. Probably the cutest veileds ever laid! And, no, I"m not prejudiced.


Additional details:
-There are three more eggs from this clutch. Hopefully, they'll hatch too.
-These eggs incubated for a little less than six months.
-We still have 45 eggs to hatch. Three of the eggs should hatch any day now. If you do the math, you'll see that we have 42 more eggs that should hatch around the end of Feb.

In other chameleon cage news...the female is pregnant again!! Also, we've separated the male and female. According to the reptile pet store, he's stressed and getting too thin. So, we now have three veiled chameleon cages. Our house is noisy with singing crickets. Craziness!

Oh yeah and...., the female is pregnant again!! We've separated the male and female. According to the reptile pet store, he's stressed and getting too thin. So, we now have three veiled chameleon cages. And our house is noisy with singing crickets. Craziness!
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19 comments:

  1. Congratulations, congratulations! Very cute. The dad is tired and stressed but the mom isn't? 45 more. This must be the most unique way to pay for a college education.

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  2. Barrie,
    You have the coolest creatures at your house!

    Donna

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  3. Whoa, cool. I've never seen a baby one before.

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  4. Wow! That's pretty cool. But what are you going to do with that many chameleons? Reminds me of a Henry Huggins book when his fish had babies... I can just imagine 45 cages spread throughout your house!

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  5. Hard to believe that the male is losing weight from stress. Very interesting indeed.

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  6. It's like you're a new mamma, Barrie! Congrats! They are so small. And cute!

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  7. Congratulations on the births, Barrie. It might help the male if he knows that pet stores will be helping to find feeders for the babies. I would be stressed and thin, too, if I had to worry about supporting 45 babies with another clutch on the way.

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  8. Look at those eyes! So adorable.

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  9. They are cute. so I have to ask, what will you do with all of them?

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  10. wow barrie, so cool! the kiddos must be so excited. i was wondering if they would actually hatch at all. they are adorable, so tiny!!

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  11. Oooohhh...fascinating! I thought it was a clam meat poking out from its shell or something. It's amusing to see how ghostlike and gelatinous chameleons are at birth, considering how they turn out as adults.

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  12. I'm so pleased you posted photos, Barrie. I was wondering when the eggs would be hatching. Thank you for showing us the wee chameleons.

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  13. Are you running some sort of chameleon bordello over there?

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Comments are always welcome!