Feed this mouse or not?

[melcvt00]

I will start off with saying that my bp grew up eating live mice, has never had frozen - he came to me as an adult.

I breed mice to feed him and the snakes of a couple coworkers. One of my breeding females that is just a few months old had developed quite a large tumor. Feed her off, or euthanize her (I have a homemade CO2 chamber) and dispose of her?

[artgecko]

If it is just a tumor and not an infection of some sort, then I think you'd be OK feeding her off. If you feel uneasy about it, then euthanize her and dispose of her. You may not want to use her offspring as breeders either because they stand a chance of developing tumors early as well, so personally, I'd use them as feeders.

[StillBP]

Best advice I can give you is if you question it don't feed it.

[melcvt00]

I was leaning towards feeding it, honestly. I was just curious what the thought was from more experienced snake owners was.

Her babies are definitely going to be feeders, for sure.

[Craiga 01453]

When in doubt, throw it out

[Kcl]

If it's truly a tumor, it's just extra cells and can't hurt the snake. Only issue I can think of off hand is if it was actually a cyst or similar, which could be checked by opening it up.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Sure you can feed it the question is, do you need to or do you have to?

I am not a fan of feeding animals with tumors or any other issues why would I when I can feed healthy rodent?

Usually if a rat or mouse develop a tumor it will be euthanized and become wildlife food.