Unsere neueste CHAMAELEO steht in den Startlöchern!
Another ‘traditional’ conference in Boppard am Rhein is on the programme for 2025. We have set the date for 16 to 18 May, so please keep this weekend free. We are currently working intensively on an exciting programme of travel reports, terraristics and scientific contributions.
Finally, the world’s most colourful reptiles have their own day! Wildlife Madagascar has proclaimed 09 May as INTERNATIONAL CHAMÄLEON DAY. And the AG Chamäleons is of course taking part. From 00:00 on 9 May 2024, we will be posting facts, exciting information, links and games about chameleons every hour. For 24 hours! We are looking forward to it!
#show your colours #internationalchameleonday #chameleonday #chameleondayMay9
We can look back on an eventful 2023. We had a great conference, lots of news about the world of chameleons and, most recently, we were able to successfully place a number of animals. Let’s hope that 2024 will be even more active. The entire board of the AG Chameleons wishes you all a Merry Christmas and happy holidays! We are particularly looking forward to next year’s conference, which will be held in Fulda for the first time in over 20 years. The programme is currently being prepared and will be published shortly – then you will also receive more information on registration and room bookings. It will be a very interesting and varied programme – stay tuned!
Bild: pikisuperstar und catalyststuff / Freepik
A long-standing member of the AG Chameleons is looking for new owners for ten panther chameleons (Furcifer pardalis) at short notice. There are ten females, including animals between 10 months and three years old. Four females belong to the local form Ambilobe, five to the local form Sambava. The animals are available individually or in groups free of charge. If you are interested, please write to us at info@agchamaeleons.de for further information.
A female, still quite young Veiled Chameleon (Chamaeleo calyptratus) from an official confiscation is looking for new and, above all, chameleon-friendly owners within Germany. If you are interested, please contact us at info@agchamaeleons.de for further information.
Two female, juvenile panther chameleons (Furcifer pardalis) from an official confiscation are looking for new and above all chameleon-knowledgeable keepers within Germany. If you are interested, please contact us at info@agchamaeleons.de for further information.
A keeper has contacted us as AG Chamäleons because he is looking for new keepers for his three Trioceros jacksonii jacksonii. Two males and one female (2.1) are for sale. One of the males was bought in 2020 already adult. Together with a female that unfortunately died, it then had offspring, of which two still remain with the owner. The two offspring are a male and a female born in November 2020. All three chameleons eat very well and are not used to daily handling. If you are interested in adopting the animals, please send an email to info@agchamaeleons.de.
Addendum 27.09.2023: All three animals have found a new owner.
The European Union plans to ban mercury-containing lamps and light bulbs without exception from 2027. In terrarium keeping, this will affect almost all lamps that are also used in chameleon keeping, such as fluorescent tubes and metal halide lamps. Some are already banned. These lamps are indispensable, even vital, for keeping chameleons. So far, EU legislation under EU 1194/2012 had always made an exception for “special purposes” such as animal husbandry. This time, however, no exception is provided! Such a ban would make countless animal husbandries impossible, for private keepers as well as in zoos and species conservation projects. Therefore, a number of associations, including the German Society for Herpetology and Terrarial Science, of which AG Chamäleons is a member, sent an open letter to the EU Commission yesterday.
The open letter can be downloaded and read free of charge here. Please support the cause and share the open letter widely so that other keepers become aware of the current situation. We need strong associations like the DGHT to represent our concerns at EU level! Please also write to your MEPs so that they get wind of this issue.
The decision has now been made: we will meet for the 2024 conference in beautiful Fulda in Hesse. The venue is the Stadtgasthof Drei Linden in Neuenberger Str. 37 in 36041 Fulda. The rooms have recently been renovated, the food on site is good and there is also a beer garden and playground for children. IMPORTANT: Room bookings at the Stadtgasthof Drei Linden are only possible from January 2024! It is a ten-minute walk from the inn to the historic centre of Fulda. So if you don’t want to stay overnight directly on site, you’ll find all the options in Fulda itself. Fulda has an ICE train station and can be reached from all directions in Germany within a few hours. More information will follow as soon as the conference programme has been finalised.
With its independently moving eyes, shooting tongue and ability to change colour, the chameleon was already the subject of superstition and myths in ancient times – and has remained so in many places to this day. An article now published by Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Böhme and natural historian Thore Koppetsch deals with precisely this topic.
The content ranges from the so-called Brooklyn Papyrus, which described a still unexplained “colour-changing” creature of antiquity, to bizarre events involving mother’s milk and chameleons in the Gambia of our time. Probably the oldest written record of a chameleon comes from Greece, from Aristotle himself, who lived from 384 to 322 BC. The term chameleon itself probably goes back to the Greek: chamai and leon were put together to form “earth lion”. However, this interpretation of the origin of the word is not entirely undisputed. The article also deals with superstitions on the island of Samos, in Morocco, Tunisia, Togo, Benin, Cameroon and Madagascar, and the use of chameleons for pseudo-medicine and occultism.
Chamäleons in der Mythologie der Völker
Wolfgang Böhme, Thore Koppetsch
Koenigiana 17, 2023, pp. 39-50
DOI: nicht vorhanden
