In their natural environment veiled chameleons have access to a great variety of insects, more than is practical or even possible to offer in captivity. It is also known that vertebrates such as small lizards and fledgling birds are consumed when the opportunity occurs. What remains a bit of a mystery is exactly what nutritional benefit each type of prey afford and what are the best to offer in a captive environment.
The best thing one can do is offer the largest selection of prey possible and strive to make the prey as nutritious as possible.
Gut Loading is the term used when referring to the practice of feeding the insects a varied diet in an attempt to make them a nutrient rich meal. Ideally the bug becomes a vessel, carrying in it's gut the food that we want to end up in the chameleon.
A good gut load would include ingredients that are not necessarily beneficial to the insect itself, such as calcium carbonate, dried egg yolk, baby cereal etc. and fresh ingredients like collard greens, sweet potato, squash, apple and carrot. It can be difficult to maintain colonies of feeder insects on a gut load diet and so a maintenance diet is generally preferred with gut load being provided 12 to 24 hours before feeding off.
Crickets, cockroaches, zoophoba worms and the like, can be kept in large numbers in bins or tubs with a commercial dry "cricket food" and water gel or crystals (carrot pieces also work well to provide moisture, but need to be replaced fairly often). The night before feeding, a selection of insects are pulled from their bins and housed in a small tub, where they are offered a more nutrient rich "gut load" diet. They will spend the night gorging themselves on this new food and will be ready to be fed off in the morning.
By practicing this method we strive to enhance the nutritional quality of the insects and offset the disadvantage of limited variety.
Maintenance diet and gut load formulas can be purchased commercially or made at home. The reader will benefit from doing some research here.
There are excellent feeders that need specific diets as well, namely waxworms and silkworms. Waxworms live in honeycombs and do well on a diet of breakfast cereal with a bit of raw honey mixed in. Silkworms require mulberry leaves or a commercially prepared "chow" made from mulberry leaves. This diet is available from the silkworm breeder.
STAPLE FEEDERS
Crickets
Cockroaches
praying mantis (sub adult)
Zoophoba worms
Silkworms
This is a good list of staple feeders, or feeders that make up the bulk of the chameleons diet. All or any combination of the above can be offered at each feeding and, with the exception of silkworms, all are easy to gut load. Additionally, these feeders are available at all stages of growth offering a good selection in size.
ENRICHMENT FEEDERS
Waxworms
Moths
Stick insects
Praying mantis (sub-adult)
House flies
There are certainly other insects that could be added to this list, but this is a decent representation of insects that can be offered to enrich your veiled chameleon's experience. Some of them are a bit more difficult to keep, but allow the keeper the opportunity to occasionally give the chameleon something new. This can be more important than might be realized. Veiled chameleons are notorious for becoming "bored" with their food and new prey will often trigger their interest and appetite.
SIZE OF PREY
The general rule is that the prey should be no larger than the space between the chameleons eyes.
This is particularly important with young chameleons, but a good idea for all stages of life.
One exception would be silkworms or waxworms which are quite soft bodied and can be much larger without presenting too much of a challenge to the chameleon.
One will find that a fully developed adult veiled can handle a large cockroach, but smaller prey should make up the bulk of what is offered.
HOW MUCH TO OFFER
During the first six months of a veiled chameleon's life, it has an amazing appetite. Reptiles are extremely good at converting food into body mass, and grow at an amazing rate during this time. However, at this stage of life they should not have access to as much as they can eat (please see specific care for females) which could be up to 25 or 30 small crickets a day! Rather they should be grown at a slower pace and offered 5 to 8 feeders per day. Growing them too fast could lead to problems with MBD as well as other developmental issues.
This should taper at about six months old and by one year of age the chameleon will most likely do quite well on three to five insects once every other day or so.
Vitamin and mineral supplementation should continue throughout the animals life (see supplements page).
