Quarantine
What is quarantine?
Answer: Quarantine is used to prevent the introduction of pathogens into a pre-existing population of animals while
allowing the health of a new one to be accessed and treated if necessary.
Does it matter if my reptile is CB (captive bred) WC (wild caught) or LTC (long term captive) ?
Answer: No it doesn't matter the situation. If you are ever bringing a new chameleon/reptile into your home you should practice quarantine procedures to protect the health of you current collection and your new addition.
Why is quarantine so important?
Answer: Quarantine is important procedure to practice because it not only protects your current collection but it makes it easier for you to access the new arrival and treat any issues before they can spread through the rest of your collection. Bacteria and parasites can be present without any symptoms at first so its important to take the necessary steps to prevent these bacteria and parasites from reaching the rest of your collection.
The following is some things to keep in mind when practicing quarantine procedures:
Answer: Quarantine is used to prevent the introduction of pathogens into a pre-existing population of animals while
allowing the health of a new one to be accessed and treated if necessary.
Does it matter if my reptile is CB (captive bred) WC (wild caught) or LTC (long term captive) ?
Answer: No it doesn't matter the situation. If you are ever bringing a new chameleon/reptile into your home you should practice quarantine procedures to protect the health of you current collection and your new addition.
Why is quarantine so important?
Answer: Quarantine is important procedure to practice because it not only protects your current collection but it makes it easier for you to access the new arrival and treat any issues before they can spread through the rest of your collection. Bacteria and parasites can be present without any symptoms at first so its important to take the necessary steps to prevent these bacteria and parasites from reaching the rest of your collection.
The following is some things to keep in mind when practicing quarantine procedures:
- Your quarantine should be in a room separate from the rest of your collection preferably with a door separating them.
- You want to have all the separate tools and equipment for your quarantine room. ie. feeding cup, mister, fresh cleaning products etc.
- The most important thing to keep in mind with this is that anything that touches 1 chameleon (or reptile) should not be used with another chameleon/reptile. So if you have more than 1 chameleon/reptile in quarantine you want to have separate tools for that chameleon/reptile.
- It's always best to start your daily routines with your established collection first before doing any chores with your quarantine.
- Be sure to wash your hands and use anti-bacterial hand sanitizer between contact with each chameleon/reptile in your collection.
- When it comes to your quarantine chameleon/reptiles set up you want to keep it as simple as possible but still provide all the necessities. This makes it easier to observe them for illnesses, poor health, infections, check feces as well as see if the chameleon is eating and drinking.
- As a general rule to ours I like to leave any treatment of parasites until the chameleon/reptile has acclimated and I know they are eating and drinking. (Unless of course the chameleon is visibly suffering from them) This allows any parasite loads to die down in numbers (since stress is a factor in increasing parasite loads) If the chameleons parasite load is heavy treatment will kill the chameleon as the treatment can result in a kind of toxic shock and death.
- until the chameleon/reptile has had at least 3 clear fecal tests its best to avoid contact with any poop that may be in the enclosure without washing and cleaning hands/tools. Keep in mind that everything can have contact with poop if your chameleon/reptile comes in contact with it and then touches something else in their enclosure. This also includes your chameleon walking on you. So be sure to keep handling your chameleon/reptile to a min. until they are out of quarantine.
- Doing fecal tests on all new arrivals is a very important step. identifying and treating any parasites is an important step to having your chameleon/reptile join the rest of your collection. As said above waiting until you have 2 clean test (3 if you had a positive test to start with) is the best way in insuring your collection stays parasite free.
- Any external parasites should be dealt with right away to ensure the health of your whole collection.
- If you notice any health concerns ie. mouth rot, abscesses etc that could progress should be addressed right away as well. Treatment is detrimental to your chameleons over all health. Some issues like early stages of mouth rot can be treated at home without a trip to the vet but for the most part they should be treated by a vet asap.
- We also recommend using a feeding cup to feed all quarantine chameleons/reptiles whenever possible. This eliminates the feeders escaping as well as having them loose in the enclosure where they can come into contact with feces before being eaten. Again using a separate feeding cup for each chameleon is an important step as well.