Sambava Chameleons for sale in the UK

Sambava is a panther chameleon locale from Madagascar. The name tells you where a line's wild ancestors came from, so it stands for a population, not a gene. Keepers buy the males for the colour they fire up to: green turning orange, then bright yellow, under a red face.

Appearance

A male at rest is green with very dark, almost black-red banding. Look at the head first. The top of the casque and the nose stay green, and the rest of the face, eyelids included, is bright red. Younger animals carry more orange through the throat pouch, chest and parts of the tail.

When he fires up, the green on his body shifts to orange and on into bright yellow. Females of every locale look alike, in pink, salmon, brown or grey, and nothing on a female marks her out as Sambava.

Genetics

No inheritance mode applies to a locale, so there is no het and no super form. Every panther chameleon locale breeds freely with every other, and in captivity that happens both on purpose and by accident. A mixed animal can closely resemble a pure one. Since no feature assigns a female to a locale, a Sambava's ancestry rests on the breeder's records. Ask which line an animal comes from, and expect a mixed animal to be sold as mixed.