Are We In Trouble.?......

Cherylee, if you can get female mice, they stink less than the males do. If you add a bit of vanilla to their drinking water, it really helps as well.

Well, he weighs less than when I bought him now. He looks on the thin side, but his skin isn't hanging on him or anything. I decided today to offer him a mouse ONE LAST TIME before I leave him alone for a while......he immediately showed interest and followed it with his head and tongue going in and out smelling it. He struck at it very lightly and let it go three times. and right before he goes to strike, his head vibrates like he's shivering, and then he strikes or if the the mouse walks up to him, he pulls back. It's like he wants it and is mustering up the courage to strike it, or he's mad as hell at it and it biting it to tell it to piss off. The only other time I"ve seen him vibrate his head like that was when I accidentally shined the flashlight into his face one night. He went into coiled strike mode and started to vibrate his head and neck area like he was really going to strike at me. At that time i would assume that he was mad at me for bothering him wth the light. This would be the same with the mouse maybe. He might be upset with it for bothering him. I am not going to introduce a mouse to him again for another week. The female is refusing to eat as well. I am not worried about her though. She's fat and healthy. The vet told me that the next step of tests that he could do for internal parasites would be to send a stool sample out to test for a bacterial infection. This is beyond his capabilities as it is at the microbial level and needs special equipment. I guess that would be the next step apart from blood tests or tube feeding if he's near death.....which he's not yet. I just changed their substrate from plain old newspaper to aspen shavings. They were both really hesitant to go on it, but now are ok.,

Please dont drown or freze a live mouse..its cruel..just put it in a bag and whack it on a table..try this instead of feeding live..if hes weak F/T might be easier on him,..Just leave him alone..dont bother him..shinning a flashlight on him is causing him much..make him a nice dark, warm hide and leave him alone for a week.

Not to be obtuse, but......how do you think they kill all of those nicely packaged frozen rats and mice that are all clean and dry and nice looking? They put them in freezers while they are still alive and allow them to freeze to death. They don't euthenize them or whack them on the head. I did that once because I thought that drowning was cruel as well, but hitting them on the head just made them bleed from their nose all over my snake and his cage. Plus, they squirm and and hit is never enough, unless I'm just not doing it right. I'll stick with drowning for now. It takes about 20 seconds and it's only a mouse. Do you not think that they don't suffer when they have the life squeezed out of them by our snakes??? They bite and fight for their lives as they are slowly suffocated,,,,,it's a matter of opinion that I think doesn't really need to end up in a heated mess of mouse ethics....LOL.,

Originally Posted by 6y0ballpython

Not to be obtuse, but......how do you think they kill all of those nicely packaged frozen rats and mice that are all clean and dry and nice looking? They put them in freezers while they are still alive and allow them to freeze to death. They don't euthenize them or whack them on the head. I did that once because I thought that drowning was cruel as well, but hitting them on the head just made them bleed from their nose all over my snake and his cage. Plus, they squirm and and hit is never enough, unless I'm just not doing it right. I'll stick with drowning for now. It takes about 20 seconds and it's only a mouse. Do you not think that they don't suffer when they have the life squeezed out of them by our snakes??? They bite and fight for their lives as they are slowly suffocated,,,,,it's a matter of opinion that I think doesn't really need to end up in a heated mess of mouse ethics....LOL.,

im sorry you are mistaken..they are gased...ask anyone.its very humane..what you are doin is not!

They are humanely put down with a CO2 chamber, then immediately frozen.

I have one myself.. Very easy to make.

Originally Posted by 6y0ballpython

Not to be obtuse, but......how do you think they kill all of those nicely packaged frozen rats and mice that are all clean and dry and nice looking? They put them in freezers while they are still alive and allow them to freeze to death. They don't euthenize them or whack them on the head. I did that once because I thought that drowning was cruel as well, but hitting them on the head just made them bleed from their nose all over my snake and his cage. Plus, they squirm and and hit is never enough, unless I'm just not doing it right. I'll stick with drowning for now. It takes about 20 seconds and it's only a mouse. Do you not think that they don't suffer when they have the life squeezed out of them by our snakes??? They bite and fight for their lives as they are slowly suffocated,,,,,it's a matter of opinion that I think doesn't really need to end up in a heated mess of mouse ethics....LOL.,

You couldn't be more wrong, cruel or inhumane. Just because we have to feed our snakes rodents doesn't mean the rodents don't deserve to be treated with as much humanity and dignity as possible while they are alive. Drowning a rodent is a disgusting thing to do and says a lot about you as a person (none good). The frozen rodents that are sold at stores and over the Internet are humanely killed by CO2. They are not frozen, drowned or whacked. The only other recognized humane form of euthanasia for a rodent is cervical dislocation which can be tricky and inhumane if done improperly.

Originally Posted by jglass38

You couldn't be more wrong, cruel or inhumane. Just because we have to feed our snakes rodents doesn't mean the rodents don't deserve to be treated with as much humanity and dignity as possible while they are alive. Drowning a rodent is a disgusting thing to do and says a lot about you as a person (none good). The frozen rodents that are sold at stores and over the Internet are humanely killed by CO2. They are not frozen, drowned or whacked. The only other recognized humane form of euthanasia for a rodent is cervical dislocation which can be tricky and inhumane if done improperly.

to ASSume that i was wrong shows how little u know..this is not addressed to jglass38 but to the person who started this..what u are doin to to those mice is cruel

I don't have a CO2 chamber, I have a credit card-some of the most handy pieces of plastic you can have on your person. Whacking is bad, too much blood and pain. Take your mousie and put him on a table you can clean easily, and psuh down on his neck with a credit card, grab his tail close to the body, and push down witth your card and pull up on his tail. DO NOT grab him by the tail tip, it will break and he will bleed and crap all over. If done right, this method will cleanly snap his neck with a cervical dislocation, and if you do it right, he will twitch and die in a few seconds, not twenty. It is very humane and easy. He should not bleed or deficate or pee and all you need is a surface and a cheap old credit card that you can get from all those junk mail offers. just be sure to scratch your name or any identifying info off the card, just so you don't confuse it with any of your others.

BUT if your snake prefers live, feed him live. Any animal that dies fairly easily will be clean and neat if you package it soon after death, it will probably not relax the sphinter muscles, I have seen the results of animals frozen to death in a freezer and they do not look peaceful and neat, they look like hell and are covered in feces and if you were a FT seller, you would have to take the time to clean them up to make them so nice looking, wheras a neck snapping or gassing doesn't give them the time to muss up and get dirty if it is done right.

I do agree that snakes are pretty inhumane to their prey, but snakes can't get arrested for animal cruelty, and with any luck we snake owners can avoid the dumbass PETA types from wanting to eat our flesh for 'torturing' feeders. I'm not trying to debate, but there are places in the UK that are trying to pass laws against live feeders. While i doubt the same would happen in the states, I prefer to not give any crazy or simply ignorant people any more reasons to dislike snakes as pets etc.... My snake can kill a mouse in about ten seconds, i want to make it faster than that, it's not worth my time to wait for the mouse to drown.
sorry for the long post, but i think being humane is only one aspect of the feeder rodent debate.

Originally Posted by 6y0ballpython

Not to be obtuse, but......how do you think they kill all of those nicely packaged frozen rats and mice that are all clean and dry and nice looking? They put them in freezers while they are still alive and allow them to freeze to death. They don't euthenize them or whack them on the head. I did that once because I thought that drowning was cruel as well, but hitting them on the head just made them bleed from their nose all over my snake and his cage. Plus, they squirm and and hit is never enough, unless I'm just not doing it right. I'll stick with drowning for now. It takes about 20 seconds and it's only a mouse. Do you not think that they don't suffer when they have the life squeezed out of them by our snakes??? They bite and fight for their lives as they are slowly suffocated,,,,,it's a matter of opinion that I think doesn't really need to end up in a heated mess of mouse ethics....LOL.,