Why Does A Chameleon Change Colour? This Video Has Your Answer

Chameleons are known to harbour an interesting trait of changing colours. According to Britannica, by concentrating or dispersing pigment granules in the cells that contain them, these reptiles are able to change their skin shade. When pigment is concentrated, chameleons generally bear a lighter appearance, whereas when pigment is evenly distributed throughout the cells, they appear darker. A complicated interplay between hormones, temperature, and the chameleon’s autonomic nerve system determines their changing colours. Recently, an adorable and equally amusing video of a chameleon, changing its skin hue while climbing a stack of colourful pencils has grabbed the eyeballs of social media users.

The video was dropped on X (formerly known as Twitter) on September 8 by a user named Enezator. “The legendary climbing story of the chameleon,” read the post. The visual clip, seemingly recorded by the chameleon’s  ‘owner’ shows the reptile ascending a plight of piled-up colourful pencils. The animal begins its upward journey by crawling on a blue pencil and interestingly changes its skin into a blue tone. Next, it reached a yellow pencil and altered its colour accordingly with a splash of green in between.

After successfully transitioning itself into orange and pink hues as per the pencil colours, the chameleon finally reaches its destination - which is presumably the hand of its owner. Gently, with its tiny claws, the reptile grabs the person’s purlicue - the space between the thumb and forefinger and the video ends abruptly.

The video has arrested the attention of many X users, who were left amazed by the chameleon’s so-called superpower of colour swapping. “I know there’s a scientific explanation but it’s a miracle, can’t lie,” admitted one individual. “This is one of the most incredible things I’ve seen, I always enjoy looking at this,” quipped another. “Chameleons are indeed unique,” noted a third user.

Explaining the reason behind the interplay of colours in the chameleon, one X user elucidated that the video was not real and was created with the power of editing tools. “Apparently this is not true. In the final seconds of this video, a message in Chinese is displayed that loosely translates (via Google) to “this is a composite video." This disclaimer was edited out of some versions of this video that circulated on social media,” he noted.

Since being posted, the video has garnered more than 5 million views on the microblogging platform.