Cats and Feeders?

[Amaya K]

Has anyone ever considered giving a spare feeder mouse to their cat? I'm thinking about it; one if my cats is from the Humane Society and they said she used to be an outdoor cat before we got her. We don't want to let her out though, because our neighborhood has a lot of other cats and she had a leg amputated as a kitten (she's fine, gets around great and it barely affects her, really,but we don't want her getting into a fight with another cat). She eyes my feeder mice a lot, although she knows better than to eat one without permission. At least we know if a feeder ever does get free, she'll get it before it gets into the walls.

I was just wondering what other people thought and did. I know it has all the same moral issues as live feeding with snakes to give a cat a live mouse, but she really seems to miss they prey response. We play with her with cat toys often, but she always ends up back at the mouse tank. It's just something that's been on my mind, made me wonder if anyone else has done it

[wideglide]

Pretty sure she wants to bat them around and not actually eat them. I bet you'd end up with a dead, bloodied mouse sitting on your floor.

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[Amaya K]

I wasn't going to just let it lose on the floor, I probably would have put it in an enclosed area and watched the whole time.

I do know my cats, though, and while I believe our other feline Lulu would have just played with it, I think Phoebe knows exactly what they are for by the way she tries to hunt them-- I had to get a higher table to keep her out of them. Like I said, her original owners reported that she was a primarily outdoor cat, and all outdoor cats I know eat more mice in fields than food inside.

She's still gaining a healthy weight back as well, so I think she could use the protein, but like I said originally, this was more of a curiosity thing. Not saying I will or won't do it

[satomi325]

I don't have cats, but I feed my ferrets the rodents I breed. They don't play with prey and are quick to kill them. Its rarely bloody too. They are very quick clean kills. The ferrets also patrol my rodent racks and are great rodent control. They are rather obsessed. Haven't had a chew out or attempt at escapes ever since I let the ferrets in with the rats.
The rats probably have figured out that its safer to stay in the rack than try to leave. Lol

If I had a cat, I would totally feed them rodents. Once in a blue moon I may give one to my dogs too. I also had a friend who picked up feeders from me to give to her cats. They didn't really play with the prey either and ate it as snacks.

In regards to moral and ethics, if its a quick kill and the prey is not unnecessarily suffering and the predator is unlikely to get injured, I personally think its fine to feed live. Like snake live feeding, feed the appropriate sized prey. You don't want to try something huge like a jumbo adult male rat for example.

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[swolek]

Our cats eat mice all the time but I always give frozen/thawed. Not sure how I feel about live...cats tend to "play" with rodents .

[DooLittle]

I have never given my cats any rats. Mostly because I don't want them more interested in them than they already are.

[Kat_Dog]

My cat just caught 2 wild mice that came into our house the other night(we covered up that hole pretty fast)....
all she did was bat it around and sit on it until it died and then continued to play with it by throwing it 3 feet in the air.

It wasn't a bloody mess or anything, but it was pretty awful for the mouse, I wouldn't want to put one of my own rats through that, it's not quick like when a snake kills. Cats take 20-30mins or even longer to kill prey, then they don't even eat it most of the time.


If I have a surplus of rats rats when they start producing though, I might give her a pre-killed rat to see if she'll eat it... it is the best diet you could give a cat, though I doubt she will.

[TheBallPythons]

I have some cats 2 females 1 male, my females are crazy about feeders (mouse, rats and even 1 day chicks), they're good hunters when there's some evasions, and they really like the moment when i feed my snakes.My male don't care about feeders.

[GoingPostal]

It would really depend if your cat is a good killer/eater or not. My cat used to catch a mouse and then just start gobbling it down, it's quite messy feeding a fresh kill. I give her prekilled ones now, both to avoid the mess and because now she has gotten lazy, she'll catch the mouse, carry it around for a bit, get tired, drop it, catch it, start all over. You don't want mice running loose in your house and that's not a very humane situation for the it either. You'd have to step in and kill it yourself quick if the cat doesn't and it's not always easy to get a live mouse back out of a cat's mouth if you need to, trust me. I do give her live pinks sometimes but she eats them right away and it doesn't seem any kinder to freeze them first.

[I-KandyReptiles]

If you wanted to, go ahead.

I had a lady actually buy a colony of ASFs from me to breed for her cats.