Freeze my own food?

[hookfacedone]

Is it possible to freeze my own pinkies?
My method brutish mayb but would it technically work?
put them in a tuperware dish then stick it in the freezer.
My only concern is would the pinkies still be safe to feed the snake after unthawing.. i dont know if the mail order ones use anything to kill bacterai or any such thing.
one other thing how long would they last?

 

[Neumann]

Regarding the health of the mice: the T-Rex folks who produce the Mice-On-Ice products claim their mice are pathogen and parasite free. I don't know how they do it?

On the other hand there are plenty of people who breed their own mice for feeding so I'm sure you can do it and maintain healthy snakes too. IMHO I think freezing them alive would be a horrific death for an animal. I sure wouldn't want it for me but I'm not familiar the alternatives either. Gas perhaps?



Cheers,
Jason

 

[hookfacedone]

i beleave they use CO2 to kill them.
yes it may be horrible then again i imagine strangulation isnt much better

 

[Chip]

call me Hitler, but...

I freeze them alive. It only takes a few minutes, the little things are too small to whack on the head, and suffication doesn't seem to be a more humane option. It can't be worse than being bitten, constricted, or worse, just eaten alive!
I've read that humans who had near death experiences from freezing report a warm happy slumber right before they fade away.

 

[hookfacedone]

so you do freeze your own .
do u freeze them for futuire use or just to kill them? how long will they stay being frozen?

 

[Chip]

I keep them for many months

even a year. The trick is to seal them up TIGHT for storage. I use multiple ziplocks, and press all the air I can out of them before sealing. There was a post a while back about food storage vacs for mice, aw Cowboyway, where are you these days?!?

 

[hookfacedone]

would you explain your process please

 

[Chip]

pretty simple

place pinks in a tupperware. Put tupperware in the freezer. In one hour, place the clump of dead but not quite frozen solid pinks into a ziplock baggie. Press all possible air out and seal. Place baggie inside another baggie. Thaw and feed as needed.

 

[hookfacedone]

do you breed your own or buy em from a store and freeze em for future use

 

[Chip]

They all freeze just the same!

I breed my own for stubborn feeders, but buy mostly frozen from Cajun Mice. I avoid pet stores unless I'm really desperate enough to pay 5 times the amount for each pink.

 

[Taceas]

Re:

I'm with Elrojo on this. For pinkies, I just stick them straight into the freezer. They're too small to last longer than a few minutes to suffer for too long.

Bashing pinks on the head isn't recommended, as you end up with a mess on your hands if you thump them too hard.

And I've heard CO2 isn't a great idea either, as pinkies are somewhat resistant to asphyxiation due to the fact that they're all cramped together in a small space covered up with litter, and from my own experiences I tend to agree with that assumption.

I just got a breeding colony of mice (1:4) and the females just popped last weekend. I've got about 50 pinks to deal with now. Some are getting fed live to the one who prefers live food, some are getting grown up for fuzzies, and some are getting frozen from the get-go.

I vacuum pack my own feeders, as I have the vacuum sealer and the bag (the Black and Decker one is cheaper than the Food-Saver at Wal-mart). They last a lot longer when the air is removed from their bag, and I've had better feeding responses from vacuum packed mice of a month old versus a non-vacuum packed month old batch of mice. Must retain the smell better.

Best advice I can give for freezing pinks, stick em in there and walk away and watch tv. Don't think about it.