Pinky Mice for Dinner?

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri May 04, 2007 6:18 am

i forget who i discussed this with, but i was to report back if i ever followed through with my experiment it turned out very, very successful.the theory was that, in the wild, hermit crabs would come across and feed on whole dead bodies of animals. yesterday, i went to the pet store in search of frozen food, and picked up a pack of frozen pinkies (baby mice). i squeemed at the sight of the poor babies. but feeding frozen mice is the humanest form of feeding prey, so atleast i know they didn't suffer.i thawed out three little meecies, put two in one dish and one in the other dish, and placed them in my two tanks (a ten and twenty gallon). within 5 minutes of walking away and coming back, a hermit crab in the 20gal had pulled a pinkie out of the dish, and when i walked over, retreated with the pinkie into a cave where three hermit crabs eagerly picked at it. the next morning, the pinkies in the dishes were hardley recognizeable, and i couldn't fine the stray pinkie that had been pulled under the cave. i'm assuming they ate the entire pinkie.while this isn't for everyone, i think there's benefit to adding this to my hermit crabs menu, simply by the reaction i had.

Baneykinz · Post by **Baneykinz** » Fri May 04, 2007 7:13 am

Oh well, hey, that's not so bad....I could live with that knowledge. Thanks, I appreciate knowing that they don't die in pain.My only question (like my theory on meat tenderizer) is when does the gas stop? I mean, are they anethetized and killed, or euthanized? And either way, how much of that is your pet getting?I'm sure it's not enough to really harm them, but over time? It's just enough to get the job done I'm sure.Do they just freeze the pinkies, assuming they really don't know what's going on? Or do they humanely gas them too?We used to have pet rats too. Our favorite was a black and white male named Goliath, I think my nephew accidentally dropped some books on his trying to get into his cage, and accidentally broke the poor critters back....he was a GREAT pet.

Willow · Post by **Willow** » Fri May 04, 2007 7:52 am

I read on a herp site (which was about gassing rabbits for larger snakes ) that the Carbon Dioxide dissipates after a while, but you can't give your herp a freshly gassed animal. And that freezing will take care of any residual gas.I was going to try feeding my hermies pinkies, but I haven't worked up the nerve. I guess I'll have to bite the bullet and just buy a pack of them now. I'd rather let the mousie live, but everybody needs to eat. You can't make an herbivore out of an obligate carnivore (like ferrets and cats....or snakes). I read in "Ferrets" magazine that some people feed their ferrets dead mice. I'd like to try it, but I'll bet it can get messy....yuck.

Baneykinz · Post by **Baneykinz** » Fri May 04, 2007 7:58 am

OH it's carbon dioxide, I thought it was something quite a bit more detrimental to one's health. So pretty much they die of oxygen deprivation? And good to know that it isn't part of the food chain effect.You know, herbivore eats grass, predator eats herbivore, benefits from grass previously eaten by lunch, and so on and so forth.

Willow · Post by **Willow** » Fri May 04, 2007 8:15 am

Well, it does sound unpleasant, but like I said, everything has to eat. In the wild, the snakes eat live prey, but this is dangerous to the snake (the mice can bite him and cause an infection), and not very nice for the mouse. So, in captivity, since humans are (supposedly ) more civilized than animals, we try to make it more humane and safer for the animals, which is why most herp keepers use pre-killed prey.And the whole point of what we were saying is that the mice are put to sleep before they're frozen.....because you're absolutely correct, freezing to death is a horrible way to go for mammals, fish, and reptiles (though evidently it isn't too bad for invertebrates).

Pharfly1 · Post by **Pharfly1** » Fri May 04, 2007 12:41 pm

Pinky mice are a great sorce of calcium, pinkys are just a few days old when they are frozen and they have full bellies of mousey milk plus all the bones. I've been breeding mice for my snake and I have my own co2 gas chamber(ice cream bucket, hose and vinegar and baking soad put off CO2 gass). The snake is MIA right now(he hasn't ate for 4 weeks and has been loose for a week). So I have a litter of pinkies right now, but I think I'm going to give them away as pets, since they are all females and I only have room for 10 in my tank(I have 5 in there already...)

Jedediah · Post by **Jedediah** » Fri May 04, 2007 5:43 pm

That a good idea, Risu. I'm sure my crabs would enjoy this. If you know someone who breeds mice and keeps them in good conditions, this is where I would get pinkies. The mothers of the pinkies in the pet shops are (in, say, 95% of all cases and especially if they come from a big breeder) kept in bad conditions and are nothing more than birthing machines.

Jedediah · Post by **Jedediah** » Wed May 23, 2007 6:15 pm

I offered a pinky for dinner last night and there was absolutely nothing left in the morning...

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu May 24, 2007 8:39 am

I really wanna try this but I don't know if I could get myself too. I feed my snake frozen (well, thawed of course) mice and that doesn't bother me cause they eat it in one bite. With the crab, they would be picking and tearing at it.. wouln't it get kinda gross (like guts every where lol). Or not really because it's so small?

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu May 24, 2007 4:02 pm

with the pinkies, everything stayed contained. poor thing was just unrecognizable by morning.