Chamaeleo gracilis in Nechisar (Ethiopia)

Chamaeleo gracilis in Nechisar (Ethiopia)

by Alex Negro Verbreitung Science

Over the last hundred years, humans have reduced Ethiopia’s forest cover from around 40% to just 2.36%. Despite this, little is still known about the country’s herpetological fauna in some places. Scientists from Egypt, the USA and Ethiopia recently carried out a survey study in a national park.

Necisar National Park is located in south-west Ethiopia on the line of the Great Rift Valley, more than 500 kilometres south of the capital Addis Ababa. Necisar covers an area of 514 square kilometres, bordered to the north and south by two lakes, to the east by the Amarao Mountains and to the west by the town of Arbaminch. Nechisar is very hot all year round with very little rainfall.

A total of two expeditions were carried out during the rainy season and two during the dry season. Transects with a total length of 290 km and a width of nine metres were covered, 230 km of which were in grassland and stony terrain, 60 km in the forest and along the lakeshore. In addition to manual searches with the naked eye, small pitfall traps and cover plates were used.

A total of 34 species of reptiles were found, including Chamaeleo gracilis. The species was discovered twice. Both chameleons were found near different rivers, one in the scrubland and one in the forest.

Survey of reptiles in Nechisar National Park, Southern Ethiopia
Samy A. Saber, Fikirte Gebresenbet, Afework Bekele, Eman N. Salama
Russian Journal of Herpetology 31(5): 291-301
DOI: 10.30906/1026-2296-2024-31-5-293-301

Presentation in Frankfurt about feeders

Presentation in Frankfurt about feeders

by Alex Negro Book publications Live lectures

To kick off its 2025 lecture series, the DGHT Frankfurt city group has invited two speakers for Friday, 17 January 2025. The two successful terrarium keepers Walter Wiest and Stefan Greff will be talking about their book project and their efficient feeders breeding programme, which was only published by Natur und Tier-Verlag at the end of last year. High-quality feeders are essential for the successful keeping and breeding of predatory freshwater fish, amphibians, reptiles, invertebrates, small mammals and insectivorous birds. Variety is essential for a healthy diet. The best way to ensure such a varied diet for the animals you keep is to breed invertebrates yourself. In their practical guidebook, which they will present to us this evening, the experienced breeders describe how this can be done without much effort and is also fun.

Stefan Greff & Walter Wiest Breeding feeders on your own [German]
DGHT City group Frankfurt
Zoo school of Zoo Frankfurt
Bernhard-Grzimek-Allee 1
60316 Frankfurt am Main
Lecture starts at 7.00 pm, admission from 6.30 pm

Picture: The newly published book by the two authors, NTV-Verlag

Presentation in Hamburg about Madagascar’s chameleons

Presentation in Hamburg about Madagascar’s chameleons

by Alex Negro Reiseberichte Live lectures

If that’s not an exciting and highly interesting start to the new lecture year! On Friday 10 January 2025, Falk Eckhardt, a long-standing member of the Chameleons Working Group, will be giving a detailed talk on the chameleons of Madagascar.

Hardly any other lizard family is as well known as the chameleons. This is mainly due to their many special features, such as their independently movable eyes, rapid colour change, sling tongue, pincer-like feet and prehensile tail. Madagascar is considered the centre of species diversity in this family. Almost half of all chameleon species, including the world’s smallest and largest species, live on this island. There are currently around 100 species on Madagascar, divided into four genera. Representatives of the two original genera Brookesia and Palleon are predominantly small, brownish in colour and usually stay close to the ground. Their ability to change colour is limited and their tail is rather short. The two other genera Calumma and Furcifer, on the other hand, show all the classic characteristics of the ‘typical’ chameleon.

In his lecture, Falk will discuss the distribution and lifestyle of Madagascan chameleons. Special attention will also be paid to the short lifespan of some species, which Falk has also worked with professionally over a longer period of time. The importance of chameleons in Malagasy culture will also be discussed. That really sounds like a wonderful chameleon evening!

Falk Eckhardt Madagascar’s chameleons [German]
DGHT regional group Hamburg
Clubhouse “Am Sportplatzring”
Sportplatzring 47
22527 Hamburg
Presentation starts at 8.00 p.m.

Picture: Furcifer labordi female, photographed by the presenter

What kills chameleons in zoos?

What kills chameleons in zoos?

by Alex Negro Tiermedizin Science

Scientists at the University of Veterinary Medicine Montréal (France) recently analysed the causes of death in chameleons kept in zoos between 2011 and 2022. The Zoological Information Management System (ZIMS) was used to search for zoos that currently keep chameleons or have kept them since 2011. Questionnaires were sent to a total of 245 zoos. The questionnaires asked about the number, species and sex of chameleons kept, as well as selected husbandry conditions (coolest and warmest temperatures, humidity, feeding) and dissection results.

Around 1000 chameleons of 36 different species are currently kept in zoos worldwide. 65 of the zoos surveyed took part in the study, 48 of which regularly carried out dissections on chameleons. However, only 29 of the participating zoos were able to provide dissection results. A total of 412 pathological findings from 14 different chameleon species were analysed. Among the species kept were Brookesia stumpffi, Brookesia superciliaris, chameleons of the genus Brookesia without species identification, Calumma parsonii, Chamaeleo calyptratus, Chamaeleo chamaeleon, Furcifer lateralis, Furcifer oustaleti, Furcifer pardalis, Rieppeleon brevicaudatus, Trioceros melleri, Trioceros montium and Trioceros quadricornis. Panther chameleons were kept most frequently (226 specimens).

The statistical analysis showed that most of the chameleons in the participating zoos died of infectious diseases (46.8%). Infectious diseases included septicaemia, but also inflammation of the oral cavity, lungs, liver, kidneys and intestines. Almost 20% of the infectious diseases were in the area of the oral cavity. The most common bacteria were Enterococcus and Pseudomonas. Among the fungi, Nannizziopsis including CANV, Fusarium and Metarhizium were represented. A good third of the necropsy reports also indicated parasitoses, with these occurring both as a cause of death and as an incidental finding. Coccidia and trematodes as well as various nematodes were often present. The second most common cause of death in the participating zoos was non-infectious kidney diseases (11.4%). This was closely followed by diseases of the reproductive tract, including egg loss and egg yolk coelomitis, which accounted for 10.7% of cases.

Contrary to the authors’ initial assumption, there was no correlation between the surveyed husbandry parameters in the cages and the incidence of kidney disease. Basically, there was a tendency towards an increased incidence of kidney disease in countries where the average humidity was generally lower.

Evaluation of mortality causes and prevalence of renal lesions in zoo-housed chameleons: 2011-2022
Amélie Aduriz, Isabelle Lanthier, Stéphane Lair, Claire Vergnau-Grosset
Journal of Zoo and Wildlife Medicine 55(2), 2024
DOI: 10.1638/2023-0023

Photo: Panther chameleon in Madagascar, photographed by Alex Negro

Interested parties wanted for breeding project with Chamaeleo calyptratus calcarifer

Interested parties wanted for breeding project with Chamaeleo calyptratus calcarifer

by Alex Negro Abzugeben Projects

The larger subspecies of the Veiled Chameleon, Chamaeleo calyptratus calcarifer, from the Tihama on the Arabian Peninsula has received little attention in the herpetoculture hobby in recent years. It is therefore not surprising that notes on this subspecies are not particularly frequent in the current literature and that there is also a lack of husbandry and breeding reports. Sophie Obermaier, a member of AG Chamäleons from Berlin, would like to change this and breed the species in the long term. She herself has several adults of the species and already has over 50 eggs that are currently being incubated. Anyone who has had experience with the subspecies, would like to participate by keeping a few animals themselves or would like to take on young animals for scientific work is cordially invited to contact Sophie by email at chartar.0702@gmail.com.

Lectures wanted!

Lectures wanted!

by Alex Negro AG Interna

Our conference programme for 2025 is not yet full! That’s why we need your help: We are looking for chameleon keepers or travel enthusiasts who would like to tell us about their chameleon experiences next year in beautiful Boppard am Rhein. Whether you have recently found chameleons in Malta, Uganda or Portugal – we want to know! Or have you had a chameleon species for a few years and bred offspring for the first time? We would be very interested in a husbandry report! Even food animals or terrarium technology offer a lot of thematic choice – who dares?

P.S.: We also welcome ‘first-time presenters’ ;)

Photo: Furcifer oustaleti in Madagascar, photographed by Sharp Photography, sharpphotography.co.uk, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International

The Common Chameleon in Belezma (Algeria)

The Common Chameleon in Belezma (Algeria)

by Alex Negro Verbreitung Science

The Belezma Biosphere Reserve was only established in 2015 and is located in the province of Batna in northern Algeria. It covers an area of 262 km² in the Belezma Mountains and lies at altitudes between 915 and 2136 metres above sea level. The terrain consists of Mediterranean cedar, pine and oak forests, typical scrubland (so-called maquis), cliffs and only seasonal watercourses (so-called oueds); around 53 km² consist of cedar forest. So far, there have only been a few publications on the herpetofauna there. A recent overview study of the amphibians and reptiles found there has now been compiled by biologists from the University of Batna.

Maquis in Belezma Biosphere Reserve

The animals were searched for visually only. Various people walked transects unsystematically both during the day and at night, for a total of 500 hours at 28 locations within the reserve. The animals found were either identified directly or photographed and released.

A total of 23 amphibian and reptile species were found and identified. Chamaeleo chamaeleon was identified for the first time in Belezma. The chameleons were found at around 1040 metres in the characteristic shrublands and at 1280 metres in open terrain. The maquis in Belezma consists mainly of oak and olive trees as well as mastic bushes and Phoenician juniper.

Herpetofauna of Belezma Biosphere Reserve, province of Batna, northeastern Algeria
Messaoud Saoudi, Mohamed Bensaci, Abdeldjabar Necer, Houria Baazi, Zohra Nemili, Farouk Khelfaoui
African Journal of Biological Sciences 6 (15), 2024
DOI: 10.48047/AFJBS.6.15.2024.10672-10700

Co-Sleeping in Chamaeleo zeylanicus (India)

Co-Sleeping in Chamaeleo zeylanicus (India)

by Alex Negro Beobachtungen

A small publication recently focussed on observations of chameleons in India. Four researchers were travelling in the state of Karnataka in India and repeatedly observed chameleons at night. On a good 20 occasions, they observed single sleeping animals. However, two observations stood out from the others.

In July 2021, they observed two Chamaeleo zeylanicus sleeping less than five centimetres apart on the same branch in Narasimha Betta. A similar picture presented itself to them a little later in July of the same year in Devarayana Durga, 53 km away from the first observation. The chameleons were located in well vegetated hilly scrubland interspersed with rocks.

Unfortunately, the authors were unable to determine the sexes of the animals. As the observations were both made during the monsoon, the reproductive season of the Indian chameleon, they assume mate guarding. This involves a male ‘guarding’ a mated female for several days in order to increase his reproductive success.

Co-Sleeping in the Indian Chameleon Chamaeleo zeylanicus Laurenti, 1768
Nitya P. Mohanty, Krishna Murthy, B.R. Ansil, Ashwin Viswanathan
Herpetology Notes 2024, 17: 679-681.
DOI: not available

Photo: Sleeping Chamaeleo zeylanicus, photographed byDr. Raju Kasambe, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International

Dwarf chameleons in South Africa larger in urban environments than in the wild

Dwarf chameleons in South Africa larger in urban environments than in the wild

by Alex Negro Science

Dwarf chameleons of the genus Bradypodion from South Africa have long been known to adapt very well to urban habitats. Two scientists from Cape Town and Johannesburg have now investigated how different populations differ in body size, body weight and body condition score within urban and natural environments.

A total of 1107 individuals of five different dwarf chameleon species were studied over a period of four years. Bradypodion damaranum in George (Western Cape), Bradypodion melanocephalum in Durban (KwaZulu-Natal), Bradypodion setaroi in St Lucia (KwaZulu-Natal), Bradypodion thamnobates in Howick (KwaZulu-Natal) and Bradypodion ventrale in Jeffrey’s Bay (Eastern Cape) were each searched at night at three to eight locations. Forest fragments, grass savannahs or coastal bushland less than 15 km from the centre of the nearest town were classified as ‘natural sites’. All sites located within a city and consisting of both introduced and native flora regularly cut back by humans (gardens, public parks and green spaces, roadsides) were categorised as ‘urban’. The dwarf chameleons found were measured, weighed, sexed and marked with a felt-tip pen to avoid duplicate measurements on the same animals. Obviously pregnant females were not measured.

Statistical analyses and comparisons revealed that the chameleons at natural sites were always smaller and lighter on average than the populations of the same species at urban sites. Significantly larger and heavier in the city were both sexes in Bradypodion damaranum, the males in Bradypodion melanocephalum, ventrale and setaroi and the females in Bradypodion thamnobates. The body condition score was higher in urban areas for both sexes of Bradypodion damaranum and setaroi and males of Bradypodion melanocephalum than for the chameleons in natural habitats. In Bradypodion ventrale and thamnobates, there were no differences in body condition score between the different populations.

Research into exactly how these exciting differences come about is still pending.

Big cities, big bodies: urbanisation correlates with large body sizes and enhanced body condition in African dwarf chameleons (Genus: Bradypodion)
Jody M. Barends, Krystal A. Tolley
African Zoology 2024, 59(3)
DOI: 10.1080/15627020.2024.2402256

Photo: Bradypodion melanocephalum, photographed by suncana, licence Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International

The new CHAMAELEO is out now!

The new CHAMAELEO is out now!

by Alex Negro AG Interna Beobachtungen CHAMAELEO Haltungsberichte Science

Good things come to those who wait: we have just received the latest issues of CHAMAELEO 49. They will now go into the mail as soon as possible and will then be on their way to all AG members. The current contents can be found here. And if you are not yet a member of the AG Chameleons, you might want to become one soon! How do you like the current issue? Do you have any comments, wishes or criticism? Too thick, too thin, too much English, too little? ;) We look forward to your feedback!