Chameleons are Occasional Cannibals

Chameleons have been reported to eat other chameleons, not only babies but even individuals of equal size. This behavior is one of the reasons why they maintain a distance from each other.

Contrary to the common belief that chameleons eat only insects and arthropods, many chameleons will eagerly consume other vertebrates. This predation provides one of the few natural sources of processed vitamin A, as chameleons cannot synthesize it from provitamins, such as carotenoids.

Baby chameleons typically inhabit lower strata and denser vegetation than adult chameleons to minimize encounters and increase their options for hiding.

While I cannot say that they are particularly eager to eat each other—most of the time they do not—there are occasional instances where they will.

Regarding the mentioned species, Kinyongia tavetana, it is important to note that this species is oviparous, and the specimen shown is male. There is absolutely no awareness among chameleons regarding the consumption of their own young. The male chameleon is primarily focused on copulating with a female for reproductive purposes. The female becomes gravid for about one month, after which the eggs are incubated for around half a year. There is no mechanism for the female to identify "their" young.

However, Mother Nature is powerful and has equipped chameleons with an inherent reluctance toward cannibalism. Cannibalism is generally seen as a dead end for evolutionary lineages. Natural selection operates in such a way that the more advantageous an organism is in feeding on its own species, the quicker it risks extinction. This is speculated to be one reason why the stronger and more robust Neanderthals became extinct, while the weaker and less equipped Cro-Magnons survived. Neanderthals were known to be cannibalistic.