Baking soda and vinegar

[michaelh]

My gay rats have finally come out of the closet and produced so it will soon be time to think about euthanising them.

I have read the threads about bricks and gas bottles and have no doubt they all work.

My preference is for the gas and I am wondering if anybody has tried the baking soda method and if they have ant feed back. Seems cheap and easy to me but any info would be great.

I was thinking of getting the mother in law to just bite their heads off......

Cheers
Michael

 

[instar]

I did try that much, didnt seem to work at all, i might have mixed it wrong.


i had to resort to "the brick!" it was horrible. unless you cant get them where you live, i reccommend sticking to frozen, cheaper in bulk. maybe you can find a working tuckerbox freezer in the trading post? cheers :wink:

 

[womas4me]

Michael,we are going to use the same method and found some instructions on www.alysion.org//euthanasia/index.html but haven't tried it yet. We are going to do a trial first with quantities before using it on animals. Hope it helps

 

[Bryony]

i can't bring myself to do CD, the brick trick or the freezer........
i have only ever CO2 my ratties

 

[basketcase]

yup CD sucks, did it a few times and felt like abolsute **** afterwards, even tho i did it right. the brick wall is the best option imo

 

[Bryony]

there is another way.....so CD is easier.......
its an old vet nurse/reasearch method....not sure if you have heard it b4

to make CD easier, you first stun the rat by spining the rat around, you spin the rat so your arm is doing a full windmill arm action, the blood rushes to the head and KO's the ratty for a while....
its an old way and i haven't tried it b4

 

[Fuscus]

Michael,we are going to use the same method and found some instructions on www.alysion.org//euthanasia/index.html but haven't tried it yet. We are going to do a trial first with quantities before using it on animals. Hope it helps

Interesting what this article says re precharging

 

[michaelh]

Thanks everyone,

CD????

Ive read that article and am planning on building something similiar to what they suggest but with valves instead of sharpened dowel.

I have seen the precharging suggested elsewhere to stop them freaking out. I guess there will have to be a little trial and error unfortunately.

 

[peterescue]

I use cervical dislocation. It is quick and doesnt involve messy apparatus or suffocation.

 

[moosenoose]

Its the little click in the CD execution that would spin me out too much! Like for some people the dragging of fingernails down a blackboard - the click of a breaking neck gets me! Urrrgg! That and dental injuries! No,no,no,no,non,non,non,n,no,n,no,non,on,no,n,nooooo!

 

[BROWNS]

Yep CD wouldn't be my choice that's for sure....as for freezing,i used to get frozen rodents from a rodent breeder and when i'd open the bags the mice or rats were in a hunched up position, as you would be freezing ya nuts off, and the claws all sticking out.They still looked alive and all i could think of each feed time was how the rodents died...you could see it in their faces"True"I actually hate mice and rats but that doesn't meen i don't care if they've been killed humanely or not.

I used to breed my own rodents years ago, and with the smell and extra work and then having to cull them for food for my snakes was all a bit much for me.I've also been nailed too many times by big nasty mother rats.

These days i get bulk frozen rodents and not from the breeder who puts them in the freezer alive to kill them...

How long would it take for the rat to die after being put in a freezer?

 

[Bryony]

I've also been nailed too many times by big nasty mother rats.

i have never been 'nailed' by any of my rats (lab rats) (except for a one off crazy baby rat ( :evil: evil buggger) )
the older the rat the more placid they become....unless you handle them wrong :?

How long would it take for the rat to die after being put in a freezer?

my understanding of this is after the initial cold/freezing feeling an anaethetic effect kicks in eg loss of feeling, loss of consciousness
There is a big debate about which method is more humane......
CO2 = suffocate
Freezing = freezing to death + internal bleeding.

 

[BROWNS]

unless you handle them wrong

I handled them as little as possible...Most were fine but i've had a few real mean ones that latched on each time i put my hand in the cage...they were obviously fed off straight away..

my understanding of this is after the initial cold/freezing feeling an anaethetic effect kicks in eg loss of feeling, loss of consciousness

Any idea on a time span Bryony?

 

[Hickson]

an anaethetic effect kicks in eg loss of feeling, loss of consciousness.

:shock:
Sounds like Shermy on a Friday night!

:twisted:

Hix

 

[nuthn2do]

Heads up.
The NSW gov animal ethics comittee (AEC) have ruled freezing and drowning of any animal as unacceptable. Most of their guidelines are derived from the 2000 Report of the AVMA Panel on Euthanasia which can be found here:
http://www.avma.org/resources/euthanasia.pdf

 

[Nome]

Yep CD wouldn't be my choice that's for sure....as for freezing,i used to get frozen rodents from a rodent breeder and when i'd open the bags the mice or rats were in a hunched up position, as you would be freezing ya nuts off, and the claws all sticking out.They still looked alive and all i could think of each feed time was how the rodents died...you could see it in their faces"True"I actually hate mice and rats but that doesn't meen i don't care if they've been killed humanely or not.

I used to breed my own rodents years ago, and with the smell and extra work and then having to cull them for food for my snakes was all a bit much for me.I've also been nailed too many times by big nasty mother rats.

These days i get bulk frozen rodents and not from the breeder who puts them in the freezer alive to kill them...

How long would it take for the rat to die after being put in a freezer?

:looks at wounds from big nasty mother rat gotten when transferring her babies to new box yesterday:

Agreed, I think freezing to death is a horrible thing, very painful for the rat. They are warm blooded like us, and I just imagine me freezing to death.

I personally use CD, but if I had the oppurtunity would use CO2. A friend puts his in an airtight container, about 10 at a time, and within 5 mintues they are all dead. Not sure on that one though :?

 

[peterescue]

If you get them drunk they will just lay down in the snow and freeze to death.
Works on people all the time.

If you are unable to dispatch your rodents humanely you should consider buying prekilled/frozen only or befriend some loony who can do it for you.

 

[Sdaji]

I'll humanely kill rats for anyone in Melbourne too squeamish to do it (you can pay me in rats ), they have to die and I know that killing them myself doesn't increase their suffering. I usually get frozen, just for convenience (I stopped breeding a few years ago, it was too time consuming), but when cheap live ones are available I buy them. I usually use clonking or cervical dilocation.

Whether or not you care is up to you, but freezing is extremely inhumane for a warm blooded animal. The time taken to die is extremely variable. I was once at a friend's place, she made a big suprise noise when she opened her freezer and saw about ten live mice in there. They'd been in there for about 20 hours and still looked pretty healthy. They had huddled together to stay warm (and had thawed some of the stuff they were sitting on, frozen peas if I remember correctly), they'd even had fun eating some of the frozen food in the freezer! I read a story about a colony of rats which survived and bred for several years inside a sub zero warehouse used to store frozen foods, although I can't be 100% sure it's true.

 

[peterescue]

Ditto/Sydney

 

[Bryony]

unless you handle them wrong

I handled them as little as possible...Most were fine but i've had a few real mean ones that latched on each time i put my hand in the cage...they were obviously fed off straight away..

well my lab rats are handled everyday while i weigh them ect. so they get used to my scent and my voice and are the most placid animals, mind you they only last about 3weeks or more cause then we use them. But in my experience if you handle them correctly and almost everyday (like when cleaning) they are much more pleasent to handle.

Other things that help them be more pleasent is if holding by the tail......hold at the base, i have seen so many uni students grab them by the end of the tail and see them get bitten and i just say 'well you deserved it, you didn't hold him correctly' he he he 1 up for ratty
i als don't just hold them by the base of the tail, i support them or craddle them in my arm whil i do what i have to do.

quality of life is what i aim for

my understanding of this is after the initial cold/freezing feeling an anaethetic effect kicks in eg loss of feeling, loss of consciousness

Any idea on a time span Bryony?

well since it has been confirmed that its against animal ethics i'll leave that one