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| Name: |
Darnell
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Age: |
Two and a half years old
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| Gender: |
Female
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Kind: |
Jackson's Chameleon |
| Home: |
Honolulu, Hawaii
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Darnell was found four days after New Year's Day in 2014. Oahu has a very large population of
wild Jackson's Chameleons. It isn't uncommon to see a few while you're hiking or
sightseeing in the forests. Our friends were hiking a trail up near their house when they
saw Darnell badly camouflaged on a dead tree, so they gently netted her and brought
her home. I should add that she was named by the boys that found her.:)
Darnell had a cage custom-built for her as soon as she got home, where she lived
comfortably for a few months until she got too big for it. Luckily, around that time, we
were scheduled to take in another friend's chameleon who had recently purchased a
dog and paid little attention to the lizard. The new guy came with a medium-sized cage
and eventually, a large chameleon 'mansion,' about 5 feet tall. So Darnell and the new
chameleon, Lightning, moved in together. Chameleons generally aren't supposed to be
housed together, but in this case, they just avoided each other because there was so
much room.
Darnell still lives happily in her 'mansion' a year and a half later. She loves crickets
dusted with calcium and occasionally the wild grasshoppers, roaches, and beetles that
we sometimes catch at a local park. Darnell also likes the liquid vitamin supplement we
drip into her mouth twice a week after meals. She's seen two other chameleons come and go
and another that we consider her nephew. We believe Darnell is special, because she
has run away three times now (when she's out for exercise), but she's never far from her
home and food when we find her, and willingly returns to be spoiled more. Darnell is
also the fattest chameleon we've ever seen, thanks to a steady diet and plain laziness.
Darnell is reaching the end of her life span, as female Jacksons only live for a few
years, but she continues to provide our friends and I with wonder and fascination to this
day.
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Talk about Darnell in Pet Talk!
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