Is it ok if my bp eats a live mouse, live?

[MelissaFlipski]

As for the philosophy behind killing something yourself--that's more complex, and I certainly don't want to tread on toes over a personal belief issue. In my opinion, if you are responsible for the ending of a life, you should not flinch from looking the creature in the eye and doing it yourself. If you are keeping a carnivorous animal, then you're responsible for taking lives to feed it, whether you do it, or someone else does. I don't believe that passing the responsibility off to another person shows respect for the animal...quite the contrary. If you cannot take a life yourself, then you shouldn't be responsible for it being taken either. I also don't believe that allowing your pet to make the kill itself means you aren't responsible for the death.

We feed F/T (we did live once to break a short fast). We have a dog and a cat, too, and I certainly wouldn't kill their dinner for them either.

[Ginevive]

I feed live. That said, sometimes I feed prekilled. I usually do this if I am feeding a rat that seems overly aggressive; it is pretty rare. Snakes have been constricting their own food since.. well, a lot of years ago, and they do it fine. I have a concrete floor, and I whack the rat against it and honestly, they always die on impact. If I were not completely confident in my ability to kill them instantly, I would never do this. I definately do Not condone stunning a prey item.. making the poor thing suffer incoherently through even a minute of time is horrible in my opinion. I see nothing different with me killing a rat for food, and an expert marksman taking a large deer with a single shot. In either case, a shoddy and unconfident killer is an insult to the prey item.

[MeMe]

I see nothing different with me killing a rat for food, and an expert marksman taking a large deer with a single shot.

The deer has a chance to get away...A trapped rat doesn't.

just sayin'

[Ginevive]

I guess that that was a bad analogy. it is more like I should have compared the rat to a farmed animal, not a deer. Unless you bring into the equation those "canned hunts" where people pay big money and are guaranteed a deer.. but don't get me started on that topic! I am glad that you brought that up.

[MeMe]

I am glad that you brought that up.

[frankykeno]

I haven't finished reading through, but the cardiac arrest theory seems to be widely accepted in the scientific community. I read about it in the "Encyclopedia of Snakes."

Just a few excerpts from articles you might be interested in Melissa.

The pressures of 6.1–30.9 kPa (46–232 mm Hg) exerted on small mammal prey by constricting snakes range from about half to over twice a mouse's systolic blood pressure, and are probably 10 times larger than the venous pressure. These high pressures probably kill mammalian prey by inducing immediate circulatory and cardiac arrest, rather than by suffocation alone.

(from a research paper authored by Brad Moon, Department of Biology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI)

In this study, we measured constriction pressure of 5-175 kPa in 12 species and 30 individuals, which varied in diameter from 0.85-12.5 cm. Constriction pressure varied significantly with snake diameter and number of loops in the coil. The measured pressures are high enough to kill many kinds of prey animals by circulatory arrest or spinal fracture, both of which are faster than killing prey by suffocation alone, and therefore are probably safer for the constrictor.

(from Biology of the Boas and Pythons, Pp. 207-212, Brad R. Moon & Rita S. Mehta authors)

Suffocation is one common explanation for how coiling kills. But it takes about four minutes for a rat to die of asphyxiation, whereas a snake can constrict a rodent to death in just one.

(from Natural Curves - How Snakes Use Bending Skills, authored by Carl Zimmer)

For 30 prey capture sequences, the mean time required for striking at and encircling prey was 1.6 seconds.

(From Kinematics and Time Relations of Prey Capture by Gopher Snakes, a study undertaken by O. E. Greenwald where they used high speed film to capture constriction sequences)

Now that's Mother Nature at her best!

[WingedWolfPsion]

Sure, I would be perfectly willing to kill a cow for my steak. Alas, I cannot afford an entire cow, nor do I own a ranch, so the opportunity isn't available. I spoke of a willingness to do the deed yourself, though, not an adamant requirement for always doing it yourself. Same goes for dog and cat food. If I were raising livestock, I would butcher my own food. Since I'm not, I rely on others to do it--but I am WILLING to do it. I just put in an order with RodentPro, too, as I need some extras until my rodent colonies are well established.

If someone can explain what is inhumane about smacking a rodent over the head hard enough to cause a death so instantaneous that even reflex twitching is absent, I'll be listening. Not missing, or flinching, or failing to hit it right--but actually doing so correctly, which is remarkably easy to do.

Cervical dislocation, an approved method, involves grasping the rodent by the tail, placing a bar behind its head and pinning down its neck, and then yanking really hard. This seems far easier to screw up than a good hard smack over the head.

Instant brain death is pretty hard to top when it comes to humane ways to kill animals. Given a list of various methods of rodent death here, I know it's the one I would choose for myself. I would not want to be put down with carbon dioxide, have my neck broken, or be squeezed to death by a snake.

If someone isn't hitting a rodent hard enough to kill it, they're flinching. It doesn't take that much force to take out a mouse. I've never had a problem with one still breathing if I didn't intend it to be.
I question any veterinarian claiming that a constrictor's method of killing a rodent is humane. I also very highly doubt that they all agree on the issue. Veterinarian training doesn't automatically make a person's opinion on animals correct, or more valid. That depends entirely on the situation. If any individual vet's opinion was always completely trustworthy, then they would never disagree on anything.

Natural (which is a questionable term when you're dealing with feeding a domesticated rodent to a captive bred snake in a plastic tub) does not equal humane.

I think the reason people dislike the idea of whacking a mouse to kill it is simply because it seems brutal. That's actually apparently a consideration when it comes to dispatching livestock, too--more brutal methods are disfavored because they upset workers. I feel that CO2 is impractical when you're only killing one or two rodents in a day, and that cervical dislocation is actually less humane--because the rodent suffers frightening restraint before it dies, due to the bar placed at the back of its neck. I'm not particularly concerned with what vets have to say on the issue, unless they can show some hard evidence that rodents somehow feel pain after their brain has been smashed, but not after their neck has been broken.
I grit my teeth and get the job done.

What's ironic about all of this is the fact that obviously no one worries about things like death by dehydration in a glue-trap, death by broken spine in a spring-loaded mouse trap, or the horrible death due to hemorraging suffered by rodents that eat rat poison.

Compared with those very widely accepted methods of killing rodents, I think a whack over the head is beyond any shadow of a doubt quite humane. I see no reason to make a distinction between a domestic rodent and a wild one that's gotten the label of 'pest'.

The funny part about that is, when I lived in a place that had mice, I used live-traps to capture them, rather than any of those methods. I don't believe in causing death needlessly.

Brain trauma is approved as a means to dispatch livestock--a metal bolt through the brain, for example. This means that it is, in fact, considered a humane way to kill an animal. The SOLE reason it's not used for rodents has to do with some people flinching, and not hitting the animals hard enough, and also with the fact that laboratories generally need their rodents uncrushed. Since I don't have that problem, I am confident that the rodents I kill this way all die instantly, without emotional trauma or pain.

There seems to be some idea that I must be a cruel or brutal person, while those who feed live aren't...this is odd. lol I may be one of the few people in the world who will stab a pan fish through the brain before cleaning it.

I see people adamantly defending their decision to feed live. That's fine, but don't claim it's more humane than pre-killing the rodents...that's just silly. It's also completely beside the point. Different people have different views on the level of distress that it's acceptable to inflict on an animal that's destined to be food. They aren't wrong because they disagree with you. It's a personal choice based on personal beliefs.

I'm not better because I choose to feed f/t to everything as soon as I can get them to accept it. You're not better because you choose to feed live. The guy who feeds live is not better than the guy who smashes a rodent's skull in with a hard object first, or vice versa. A person feeding purchased f/t is not better than one that raises and kills their own rodents...or vice versa. None of these is a 'better' way of doing things, so long as our snakes are healthy and uninjured.

People seem to forget that the dead or stunned rodent is immediately constricted by the hungry snake. That pretty much precludes it waking up, since as has been claimed repeatedly, the squeezing knocks it out. If it's unconscious, it won't be feeling broken bones either. This all occurs in well under a minute. I've seen a constriction of a live, unstunned animal last twice that long, so I can't imagine why it would be considered less humane.

[Adam_Wysocki]

If someone can explain what is inhumane about smacking a rodent over the head hard enough to cause a death so instantaneous that even reflex twitching is absent, I'll be listening. Not missing, or flinching, or failing to hit it right--but actually doing so correctly, which is remarkably easy to do.

Just because it's "remarkably easy" for YOU to do, doesn't mean that it is "remarkably easy" for EVERYONE .... The point that that AVMA has made about "whacking" is that it is inhumane because if it is done INCORRECTLY, the rodent could be left still alive but in SEVERE pain. All you'd have to do is read around this very message board a little and you'll find threads posted by people that have "whacked" a rodent only to be shocked a few minutes later when it "wakes up" and is limping around the snakes enclosure.

If you have a specific methodology for "whacking" your rodents to death that works 100% of the time, good for you ... unfortunately, there are many many people that swing the animals around by the tail and knock them into a wall, place them in pillow cases and slam them on the ground, hit them with a book, or even throw them against something that aren't 100% successful 100% of the time ... those are the people and methods that have caused the AVMA to deem "whacking" inhumane.

Hope this helps.

-adam

[BallPythonsRule]

If you have a specific methodology for "whacking" your rodents to death that works 100% of the time, good for you ... unfortunately, there are many many people that swing the animals around by the tail and knock them into a wall, place them in pillow cases and slam them on the ground, hit them with a book, or even throw them against something that aren't 100% successful 100% of the time ... those are the people and methods that have caused the AVMA to deem "whacking" inhumane.

Hope this helps.

-adam

That I would consider kinda' harsh...
On this topic, people have different opinions on feeding f/t, pre-killed or live.. so maybe we should just leave it at that?

[MeMe]

That I would consider kinda' harsh...

How is what Adam said harsh??? what exactly is so harsh about his post?

On this topic, people have different opinions on feeding f/t, pre-killed or live.. so maybe we should just leave it at that?

And you are correct...Everybody does have different opinions so why is it that you think that he shouldn't post his...or anybody else for that matter.

Simple enough...If you don't like what you are reading..don't read it.


Hope this helps.

Memes