Freezer Problem

I have a mini fridge down here in my room where I keep drinks, snacks, ect in and I use the freezer to store Zim's feeders. Well the freezer froze over. I have a big chunk of solid ice inside the freezer compartment. When I went to get a feeder out last night, the swinging door that keeps the freezer seperate from the fridge broke off. I put it back in (its only resting on the ice because a piece broke off. There is no way of actually re-attaching it.

I didn't feed Zim last night because of all this and so I went just now to get a feeder and all the feeders are now thawed. There was ice in the ziplock bag and the feeders feel cold to the touch, so they've only been thawing over night. Would it be safe to feed Zim one of these feeders and just discard the rest?

if it thawed overnight it is fine. more than 24 hours thawed out and it will start to break down and decompose and you definitely don't want to feed it.

I'd be comfortable doing that if I were in your shoes. Wouldn't be any different than thawing one in the fridge overnight before heating it up the next day.

Should I throw the others out. I'll have no way of re-freezing them since I'm not allowed to keep them in the main house freezer. Looks like I'm going to have to be getting a new door for the freezer or a new mini fridge. I might just go out and buy a small freezer thats just by itself.

Also, should I buy only one at a time now that I can't freeze them?

if you have no way of refreezing you'll have to toss them. they won't last thawed out more than 24 hours or so. you will also have to buy one at a time until you can freeze them--otherwise you'll just have bag of warm, rotting rodents.

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otherwise you'll just have bag of warm, rotting rodents.

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Mmm, and doesn't that sound yummy! LOL

Thanks everyone. I'm off to feed Zim, weigh her and the like. She's growing quite a bit now. Beginning of March Weight: 50g. Current Weight: 71g

Feed him all he can eat before you throw any out. Thats just my look on it

He just moved up in prey size so feeding him one is enough. I already threw the remaining 3 out. There were four total. I weighed them all: 8g, 8g, 7g, 6g. I fed him the 7g since the two 8g were all the way thawed and not cold.

I'll be talking to my grandmother on the best way to go about fixing the fridge or getting a new one.

I was assuming you had a whole bunch of frozen mice.

If its the kind of mini fridge I'm thinking of, the freezer door isn't even really necessary. the back is probably open to the rest of the fridge also. As long as it still gets freezing cold it should work well enough. Just be sure to defrost it occasionally.

How do I go about defrosting it. There is a solid chunk of ice sitting in the freezer section. Wouldn't it all melt if I turned the dial down? Then it would get everywhere.

It should have a drip pan in the bottom to catch all the melted ice that runs down.

My fiance and I just found a small freezer (about the size of my mini fridge. About 2ft tall) at Best Buy for $260 something. Plus its $50 because its an open box item. And my fiance can get a discount. I might get one of those and just stock up for months at a time with feeders. How long is the shelf life of a feeder when frozen?

You can get 5 cubic foot chest type freezers for about $150-$160 new. I wanted a smaller one that I could move easier myself so I ordered a 3.5 cubic foot from Circuit City online for $149 with free shipping. FedX guy wasn't too happy. =)

It's about the size of a larger dorm fridge but it's all freezer and top opening.