Question about.feeing dead mice

[wdissident]

So I have 10 mice. I came home today and one was dead. So I took him and put.him in the freezer. Since.i dont know why he died is he still ok to feed the snake? Or should I purposly.kill them and just freeze them?

[stephanbakir]

I personally wouldn't feed my snake anything that had an unknown cause of death.
If the mice came from the same place and were a recent purchase, I would not feed them to my snake for at least a month to make sure the others are healthy.

[RandyRhoads]

Dead Mau5 :yes:

If you try to feed a dead mouse, it probablly wont eat.:eek:

Seriously though, by the time I get home from buying them normally at least one is dead. Most of the time other mice are gnawing on it. Did yours have food, water, bedding, and nice room mates?

[KORBIN5895]

I'd feed the dead one off.

[wdissident]

I use a water bowl and it made a mess which caused the humidity to rise. Other than that ive just been feeding oatmeal and use shredded paper as a bedding.

[Chu'Wuti]

RandyRhoads posted, by the time I get home from buying them normally at least one is dead.

This suggests to me that your supplier is not providing proper nutrition or not meeting other husbandry needs of the mice you're buying. If the mice aren't healthy enough to survive a trip home, then they aren't healthy enough to feed your snakes.

I'd ask to see the supplier's mice-breeding/raising facilities. What type of feed is being given to the mice? Cheap dog food is NOT appropriate, but a lot of people use it in an effort to save money/make a bigger profit. wdissident said, ive just been feeding oatmeal. You have the same problem--like cheap dogfood, oatmeal does not provide the proper nutrition to mice/rats. Bottom line: Malnourished mice/rats will, in the long run, lead to a malnourished snake.

Another aspect of feeder prey health is general husbandry--how water is supplied, how often, cleaning, temps, etc. Mice/rats that live in unhealthy conditions will be unhealthy themselves.

We had a big discussion about this on our local forum recently, because we were considering breeding mice/rats to help the local herp society with funding. After considering all the husbandry and feeding requirements--meaning, what we would need to do to raise the healthiest mice/rats, not just to "get by" with a cheap/inadequate product--we decided not to go into this business.

If you want to raise your own, fine, but keep in mind that the quality/health of your feeder prey will affect the quality/health of your snakes or other animals that eat them.

[Chu'Wuti]

I thought you might find some of our herp society's discussion of benefit:

From an experienced rat breeder: I have been raising my own rats for several years now and I can tell you that it is not an easy or profitable task. I will leave out of this the issues of our ability to stay "non-profit" as well as offending any society contributors. First of all, I don't understand the sudden need for rodents. I have personally offered rats for sale on this forum many times at prices WELL below anyone else's prices and had little to no response. There are many places for our members to obtain feeders without burdening a handful of members for nothing more than a tax deduction. With that being said, let's get into why!

1. It seems to me the people in favor of this have no experience consistently breeding rodents.

2. There was a mention of rotating a 5 to 7 tub rack. This one rack will on average produce a few dozen feeders per month on an annual basis. At some point, these breeders will start producing less. That is if you have no disease or, sorry, infestation of rodent mites (look it up!) that kills the entire colony. All along the way, you will have to constantly hold back rats to replace sick, dead, or old breeders that have stopped producing.

3. Putting said rack in a "garage or shed" will work fine as long as "garage or shed" has thermostatically controlled heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer! My small rat building has both, which on average adds $30 - $40 a month to my electric bill. Without it, they will not breed and die.

4. When I started breeding rats, I fed them Mazuri 6f Rodent Breeder...all was well! As it became difficult to obtain, I fed "dog food". I noticed my litters went from 15 pinkies to 3. My female breeders began to have tumors. We actually had a female who gave birth through her rib cage, a gaping hole that you could put a golf ball in. We realized that our colony did much better on Mazuri. We now feed nothing but! Currently, we are paying $21 a bag and on average we go through 2 bags a month (we only have 2 racks, 6 tubs per). This is not to mention that many people believe that any type of dog food that contains red dye will do harm to your snake's kidneys/liver (again, look it up). I'm with you, you would think that you could keep your rats on a diet of nothing but dirty diapers, but it don't work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5. Watering? Do you plan on using water bottles? Be prepared to fill them daily! Do you plan on using a water system? Be prepared to check every nipple on a daily basis. Water nipples do one of two things. One, they stick open and drown all your rats. Two, they stop watering and without water they will die quicker than being fed dog food. Use bottles, get tired of filling them. Use water system, have the ability to rebuild or replace nipples as needed (somewhat constant and expensive).

6. Cleaning...we go through two bags of pine bedding per month. There goes another $10. If not cleaned, we've noticed that the breeding is minimal. They must be kept on fresh bedding not only to keep the numbers up but OMG to keep the odor down! I'm not talking about just the smell, but the lung burning, eye watering presence of ammonia.

7. I understand the want or need to finance our club. This is not, for so many reasons, the way to do it. If you disagree, feel free to be at my house any morning at 5 a.m."


I personally don't want to get into breeding prey animals, but I am very careful to buy my feeders from reputable sources well-known to maintain top-quality feeding and husbandry. Now maybe you think I'm picky--maybe you think your snake is doing just fine.

However, keep in mind that the impact on your snake's health may be unnoticeable (to you) but very real in terms of longevity and ability to breed.

Further, as someone who has taken in a lot of snakes (and other critters) needing rehoming over the years, I can attest to the fact that LOTS of people believe (supposedly) they are doing "everything" they should be doing and will protest loudly about how often/well they feed, etc. even while their animal is visibly starving to death. Two of the last three animals I took in--THIS year--were in VISIBLY poor condition; one of them is gaining weight but his spine still shows more than it should (colubrid), and the other was so far gone I was unable to save her (veiled chameleon).

I don't want to beat a dead horse, but I think this is worth repeating:

Unhealthy mice/rats = unhealthy snakes. HEALTHY MICE/RATS = HEALTHY SNAKES.

[wdissident]

All I want to know is it the snake will be fine eating dead prey. He wasnt dead more than an hour.

And as far as malnourishment there were carrots and potatoes in there also. u think my mkce that eat oatmeal and carrots are less nourishing then the frozen ones at petco?

[Chu'Wuti]

As Stephanbakir said, I personally wouldn't feed my snake anything that had an unknown cause of death.
If the mice came from the same place and were a recent purchase, I would not feed them to my snake for at least a month to make sure the others are healthy.

I totally agree with Stephan. You don't know whether the mouse died of malnourishment, a disease, or something else. Why take a chance on killing your snake or making it ill by feeding it that mouse?

More generally, many snakes (like mine) have been trained to eat F/T rather than live, so in general, snakes are find eating dead prey. However, I personally would never feed my snakes a mouse or rat that died of unknown causes; I only feed known healthy mice/rats that were killed humanely and immediately frozen.

I doubt anyone here is going to make you any guarantees that it's safe to feed that mouse to your snake, because we cannot know that it is.

Better to be safe than sorry, right?

[LadyWraith]

And as far as malnourishment there were carrots and potatoes in there also. u think my mkce that eat oatmeal and carrots are less nourishing then the frozen ones at petco?

Yes. My local Petco provides frozen feeders from a reputable frozen feeder bulk company. A well nourished feeder is one that has been given the proper nutrition through a high quality diet like Mazuri or other food developed specifically to the mouses biological needs. It can't be assumed that a plethora of random items from our kitchen can be given in replace of that unless you've done extensive research on the complete dietary needs of rodents. Just sayin'.

[Chu'Wuti]

Sounds like Dani & I agree completely. Mazuri 6f Rodent Breeder is specially formulated to meet ALL the nutritional requirements of mice/rats that are to become feeders. Even if you aren't feeding only oatmeal (which you originally implied), potatoes and carrots don't add sufficient quantities of the trace minerals and other nutrients that your mice/rats need to have to be nutritionally adequate for your snake.

[RandyRhoads]

RandyRhoads posted,

This suggests to me that your supplier is not providing proper nutrition or not meeting other husbandry needs of the mice you're buying. If the mice aren't healthy enough to survive a trip home, then they aren't healthy enough to feed your snakes.
.
They're fine in the store. I have a very long trip home. Sometimes the car is hot, they don't have water on the way home, they're shoved in a tiny dark box, they eat each other.... I don't think my issue is anything to do with them being sick...

[jarich]

I cant see it being a problem to feed the dead one. There are plenty of things that could kill a rodent that wont be any issue for a snake that eats it. What possible issue that kills a mouse, aside from poisoning, could be passed on to the snake that eats it? Im sure there might be others, I just cant think of any.

As for the nutrition given the rodents, yes it could use some serious improvement. Keep in mind though rodents arent the same as insects; they arent more or less just a product of their gutload like an insect. The nutrition gained from rodents is from the flesh, organs and bone itself. While just feeding carrots, potatoes and oats will not allow the rats to optimally breed (not sure if the OP is doing this or not) and be as healthy themselves, it will likely not effect the nutrition that is passed on to the snake. If you are trying to breed or keeping these feeders alive for any length of time, wdissident, then I would look into getting some rat chow. Its not that expensive, easy to get online, and will give you much healthier rodents. Plus then you dont have to worry about the veggies going bad or anything like that.

I would grab one of those water bottles they sell for rodents though. The mice will keep turning over the bowl and throwing crap in it constantly too.

[Chu'Wuti]

Jarich said, Keep in mind though rodents arent the same as insects; they arent more or less just a product of their gutload like an insect. The nutrition gained from rodents is from the flesh, organs and bone itself. While just feeding carrots, potatoes and oats will not allow the rats to optimally breed (not sure if the OP is doing this or not) and be as healthy themselves, it will likely not effect the nutrition that is passed on to the snake. (Bold added for emphasis)

Jarich, I really have to disagree with that last statement. Malnourished prey animals cannot contain optimal nutrition for snakes or other carnivores. As a simple example, think about calcium. A snake gets all its calcium needs met through the ingestion & digestion of whole prey--i.e., as you note, the flesh, organs, bone, and hair of the rodent.

However, if that prey is calcium-deficient to begin with, then the snake's calcium needs are very unlikely to be met. Once in awhile, this might not hurt, but on a routine basis, it simply can't be good.

Calcium is just one of the elements that our reptiles need for proper nourishment. In case some of you haven't already seen this info, here's a link to an older research report about the nutritional qualities of various prey animals. It's also posted elsewhere on this forum (multiple times). Note that there are a number of important trace minerals snakes obtain from rats/mice; if the rats/mice are deficient in ANY of these--or in the case of rats/mice fed an inadequate diet, deficient if most if not ALL of these trace elements--then the snakes simply cannot obtain everything they need from eating them. Think of good quality food for the rodents to be used as prey animals as akin to gut-loading insects for insectivores but on a longer-term basis--it is every bit as important as gut-loading.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/awic/zoo/WholePreyFinal02May29.pdf

Hair actually can be analyzed to show whether the prey animal is deficient in or well-supplied with several of the trace minerals/elements, but of course, obtaining such an analysis would be expensive. Far better to feed properly in the first place, IMHO.

[KORBIN5895]

Sandy and Daniel, you guys worry a little too much. No is is feeding rodents mazuri in the wild and both rodents and snake have done fine for centuries.

Snakes have an amazing digestive system that can digest just about anything. Also as far as I know there are no disease that pass from mammal to reptile( though I haven't looked too deeply into it).

I would also be very careful with that rat breeder you quoted. For a rat to have a golf ball size hole in it's ribs has way more problems than its feed.

Mykee breeds his own rodents and gets them up to size for about 57¢ each.

[Chu'Wuti]

KORBIN5895 said, No is is feeding rodents mazuri in the wild and both rodents and snake have done fine for centuries.

First, that is absolutely true--but rodents living in the wild have a FAR greater variety of foods in their diet than oatmeal, potatoes, and carrots, or cheap dogfood. In addition, snakes living in the wild also have a far greater variety of food sources--even if they eat "only" mice (which I take leave to doubt; I'll bet they eat other critters as well, generating even greater variety in their diet)--because they might eat one mouse or mouse family one day, then eat another mouse/family from a different area yards away another day, which would mean that the mice had been eating different things.

Second, I totally agree that the mouse with the hole in its ribs had to have more/other problems than feed; however, the feed may have caused the issue indirectly. If that mouse was housed with other mice, which many mice breeders do, and if they were all fed inadequately, then some more aggressive mice might easily have begun gnawing on a mouse weakened/slowed by pregnancy. I'm only guessing on that, though, and I definitely do not dispute your argument. I don't buy from that breeder, though not originally for that reason, and having an established relationship with another source that I'm confident uses good husbandry and top quality feed means I don't need to change my source.

Third, I also think you're correct that there are no shared mammalian-reptilian diseases, though we could both be wrong.

However, if one's mice or rats are diseased or become susceptible to disease because they are weakened by inadequate nourishment, then the breeder would be putting himself or herself at risk. In June of 2012, there was a problem at a rodent breeding facility in the U.S. with Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis, known as LCM or LCMV. This is a viral disease hosted by rodents that affects nearly five percent of the mice population. While it is rodent-born, humans are placed at risk of becoming very ill if exposed to fresh mice or rat urine, droppings, or saliva of mice/rats carrying the disease. This is not something I would want to have to deal with. (Source: Farm World – weekly farm newspaper source for ag news, classifieds, auctions (http://www.farmworldonline.com/news/NewsArticle.asp?newsid=14991))

While I would argue that size and quality are not completely correlated (think about obese people and the respective proportions of protein and fat in such people, just for a start), I do believe that Mykee is an exemplary representative of a snake breeder whose concern for his snakes is so high that he wouldn't skimp on feeding their food. I've read many of his posts and his concern for good husbandry in all areas is very obvious.

[wdissident]

Sandy do you put any personal experience into your posts? I feel like youre just regurgitating information you read online.

[Chu'Wuti]

Sandy do you put any personal experience into your posts? I feel like youre just regurgitating information you read online.

How about 40 years of snake-keeping experience? Would that do?

I do often "regurgitate" information from credible (i.e., professionals such as veterinarians or academic researchers) sources because that helps keep me from getting into a personal argument with someone. However, in addition to my snake-keeping experience, I am also an academic researcher myself (though not in the field of herpetology) and thus have a great deal of respect for academic research.

Hope this answers your questions.

As we're getting personal here, I'll note that it seems you just want someone to give you permission to feed that dead mouse to your snake and to tell you it'll be fine. A couple of people have done that even while some of us have preferred to "err on the side of caution." Now it's up to you to decide what to do.

Good luck!

[KORBIN5895]

Let preface this with a disclaimer: I am probably the worst keeper put there. I don't check temps or humidity, I refreeze my rodents after they thaw and I don't worry about when they shed or poop.

Now personally I would feed it off no problem as I am quite sure the snakes stomach acids will destroy anything that could be on that rat. I personally feel most people over think there herps. I get mine dialed in then let it be.

Also I think I really like you Sandy. Glad you you bring your honesty and experience back here .

[infernalis]

feed the dead mouse, why waste food.

[Chu'Wuti]

Why, thank you, KORBIN5895! I like being able to share honest opinions and information with people like you who don't make personal attacks on others. As long as we keep things on the information and different opinion levels, it's great to hear the variety of ways people work with their snakes.

In addition, KORBIN5895, I am quite sure you are NOT the "worst keeper out there"--I know a couple of those--one of them brought me an animal that even after two months of feeding is still underweight (you should have seen it when I got it--wish I'd taken a picture), and one of them brought me an egg-bound, calcium-deficient/MBD-afflicted, extremely malnourished cham that we couldn't save. Those are just the two most recent examples of rescues I've dealt with.

Furthermore, I am actually glad to hear you've refrozen thawed mice and fed them off without a problem. I've unhappily thrown out a significant amount of $$ because one of the snakes refused to eat one night or another . . . yet if it were MY food, I would have kept it for the next day. Your experience is reassuring; that probably is something I've been overly concerned about.

Now, wdissident, you have yet another statement supporting the "go ahead and feed it" side of this discussion from Infernalis. Seems to me that you should have plenty of information and opinions to be able to make a decision without any further attacks on anyone.

See you all in the forums!

[KORBIN5895]

Why, thank you, KORBIN5895! I like being able to share honest opinions and information with people like you who don't make personal attacks on others. As long as we keep things on the information and different opinion levels, it's great to hear the variety of ways people work with their snakes.



That is the funniest thing I have read in forever! I really like you now. By the way you can call me Kevin. Or as some like to call me douchebag.:)

As for the refreezing of frozen rodent I had a box of frozen rodents get lost in the mail for 10 days. When I finally got them I just refroze them and my snakes have been feeding on them for a couple of months now.

[mykee]

Would you eat a steak from a cow that's been sitting dead in the field in the sun for an hour?

[Chu'Wuti]

Would you eat a steak from a cow that's been sitting dead in the field in the sun for an hour?

LOL! My DH just burst out laughing when I read that to him--he says it depends on how hungry he is!

As for me, out in the sun, no, probably not! but butchers actually do "hang" beef for several hours . . .

Still wouldn't feed a mouse sitting even at room temp for an hour or ??? to one of my snakes. But maybe, as I said, I'm just pickier than a lot of people.

Except Mykee! :p

(And I've found that Mykee and Aaron_S have a LOT of valuable experience & information to share!)

[KORBIN5895]

Would you eat a steak from a cow that's been sitting dead in the field in the sun for an hour?

Yes I would. You would be surprised at what I would eat. Would you eat a steak that has been out for an hour? Have you ever been on a farm?

Also was the mouse sitting in the sun? Did I miss something?

[Chu'Wuti]

Yes I would. You would be surprised at what I would eat. Would you eat a steak that has been out for an hour? Have you ever been on a farm?

Also was the mouse sitting in the sun? Did I miss something?

ROFL!!

I don't think you missed anything, but I'm not going back to look.

This thread has become hilarious! Thanks so much for giving me something to laugh at today; I'm grading midterm exams, which can be a very frustrating experience ("How many times do I have to tell you BE SPECIFIC!!!!??? TOO VAGUE!!!!")

So every once in awhile, I come here for a laugh, and thanks to Kevin and Mykee, I'm getting some great ones!

Kevin, glad to meet a new friend--I love your sense of humor!

Mykee, I've ALWAYS loved your caustic wit as well as great information!

Now back to those exams . . .