We have a feeder rat that is a good size for both of our larger girls. Unfortunatly, neither of them will take the rat. Soon the rat will be too large. We do not want to use it in our breeding colony and if we let it go outside, there is a chance it will return to our home for food and shelter. I would like to use it as food for our ferret (its not too terribly large. Might take the ferret longer to consume it than a mouse would, but its a good sized meal (2-3oz)

I have stunned mice before, but rats are something new to me. I have attempted to stun rats in the past, but because their skulls are thicker, when I attempted to stun the rat, it went into seizures and it took a few minutes to die. It was horrible. Now I have this rat which is even older than the previous rat and I'm both afraid of causing it pain like that and not being able to stun it properly.

I CANNOT smack it against a wall or hit it with anything. I can't bring myself to be that violent. While it may not seem 'violent' to some, to me it is horrible and I can't do it. I have no access to dry ice tonight and I need to use it tonight as I am out of cage space and it is currently in a cardboard box that we brought it home in.

I can't think of anything to do other than let it go. Any advice? (Other than having a seperate enclosure for situations like this?)