classrom pets (mice) ethical question

[ohiomommy1122]

So last year in the fall we did a school pet- we choose Aquatic snails and learned all about them it was fun. Well this year we are thinking about doing mice and trying to breed them so the children can watch this. After the babies are born and grow big we plan to then get rid of the babies and the father ( so we will not have MORE babies as mice procduce a litter of 8-15 babies every 3 weeks) I will try to get people we know and in our homeschool group to take babies as pets but what would you do with the ones no one wants?

option 1
take them to a pet store were they will be in overfilled cages and maybe sold as food instead of pets

option 2
let you nieghbor take them home for food for jis snake

optopn 3 maybe I can call some school and see if some teachers may want some as class pets

I hate the idea of killing them BUT is it more human to let her snake eat them in just a few seconds or let them suffer for who knows how long in a pet store?

It is the circle of life that mice to feed other animals but its much harder if they were you pet once.

[kathymuggle]

I am not sure I would do mice -at least not for the point of breeding them.

I would be worried about how my kids would process the departure of the babies/father - it might be quite upsetting for them.

In general I believe that trying to decrease the amount of unwanted animals through spaying and neutering (or only having a single sex) is the way to go - so to deliberately bring more animals into the world is a bit off with my values so I would not do it.

I think the messages we send children about pet ownership are more important than watching them breed.

[womenswisdom]

I agree with kathymuggle. I would not want to convey the message that animal are disposable, which I think this might do. Also, I know as a child I would have been traumatized thinking about what happened to my "pets".

[zeldamomma]

Do you know that a pet store would even take them? I would tend to assume that they have suppliers, and might hesitate to take animals from just anyone due to concerns about disease, etc...

If we were going to breed animals, I would consider part of the lesson to be choosing appropriate parents, so that the offspring would be wanted. For example, our pet rabbit is a purebred with no health problems, and if we were to find a female of the same breed, and timed the litter right, we could sell the babies through our 4-H rabbit group, and feel fairly confident that they would be well cared for in their new home.

If you want your kids to have the experience of watching a mother give birth, you could contact local animal rescue groups and see if they have any expectant mothers that need a foster home.

[zjande]

I'd breed them & be happy that I was lucky enough to live right next door to a snake that would snack on the males.

Mice are fun. Baby mice running all over the cage are hilarious.

I don't personally have an ethical problem with this scenario, but you'll have to decide what makes you most comfortable.

[SundayCrepes]

Originally Posted by womenswisdom

I agree with kathymuggle. I would not want to convey the message that animal are disposable, which I think this might do. Also, I know as a child I would have been traumatized thinking about what happened to my "pets".

After the birth couldn't you just separate the sexes into different cages and let the kids keep their pets?

[moominmamma]

We raise chickens for eggs, and our neighbours slaughter and eat the males (we're vegetarians). We've had a wonderful experience breeding our hens with a rooster, hatching the eggs, raising the chicks and such. For my family and my kids I felt it was important to teach them the connection between what we eat the impact of our choices on the rest of the planet. The egg operation has been part of that learning experience. I believe that we have a responsibility to the animals we raise; they should be appropriately cared for and/or serve a good purpose.

However, I'm not sure that feeding your baby mice to a neighbour's pet snake is really what I would term a "good purpose," at least not the clearest kind of teachable-moment good purpose. And if teaching your kids the connection between living animals and pet food is not part of your agenda with this project anyway, I would suggest that a breeding pair of mice are not a very good choice for a classroom pet.

Miranda

[ocelotmom]

Originally Posted by womenswisdom

I agree with kathymuggle. I would not want to convey the message that animal are disposable, which I think this might do. Also, I know as a child I would have been traumatized thinking about what happened to my "pets".

Personally, I don't really have a problem with the idea of giving the babies to the neighbor. The snake is gonna be eating mice anyways, presumably.

However, I wouldn't purposefully breed a class pet unless I had homes lined up for the offspring (with parental permission!), because you can't just disappear the babies and not expect questions and trauma.

[kristin0713]

If you want your kids to have the experience of watching a mother give birth, you could contact local animal rescue groups and see if they have any expectant mothers that need a foster home.

I was thinking the same thing. There is also a program at a farm near us where children can participate weekly in running the farm and, depending on the season, they are able to watch animals give birth and chicks hatch. I have no idea where you live but maybe there is something like that close enough to you. I would do that over breeding the mice and giving them up to be killed. (Even though I despise mice and would not have a problem with it ethically...but from the standpoint of the mice first being a pet, then having to explain it to the children...I wouldn't want to do that.)

[WhaleinGaloshes]

Yeah, no. I wouldn't. Not in a million years.

The ethical issues of captive snakes and live food for them aside...it makes no sense to bring them into a classroom IMHO.

Many other good ideas given here...a chick program, maybe. My DD's preschool did one. Or tadpoles. Butterflies. 4-H.

Breeding captive mammals, even if they're small, for the purposes of teaching a life lesson I think is not a very good idea. There are so many other ways to do this.

May favorite is working with an animal rescue to foster a pregnant abandoned pet (a guinea pig rat or maybe hamster, probably, no one bothers to surrender pet domestic mice.) This teaches lessons in pet ownership and overpopulation, too, while the mice-breeding project accomplishes the opposite. (IMHO.)

(And if you do, please please remove the male *before* the birth or you will have two litters as mice experience postpartum estrus.)

[Bluegoat]

Years ago I went to to a zoo with a lot of snakes. The snake keeper trained them to take dead food, and seemed to think that it was a bad idea to give them live food.

I just wouldn't do this, I think. There are already way too many pets of all types around without homes. Pet stores that sell animals have a lot of issues and I wouldn't want to encourage that either.

[CariOfOz]

Originally Posted by kathymuggle

I am not sure I would do mice -at least not for the point of breeding them.

I think the messages we send children about pet ownership are more important than watching them breed.

I very much agree with this.

Originally Posted by zeldamomma

Do you know that a pet store would even take them? I would tend to assume that they have suppliers, and might hesitate to take animals from just anyone due to concerns about disease, etc...

Yes, most likely a pet store would take them unfortunately. We have pet rats and started out getting them from a pet shop. They actually told us that if we bought them very young there was a chance they could be girls (can't tell sometimes till 5weeks or so) and if they were pregnant, just to bring the litter back to them when they weaned and they'd take them to sell. And I WISH pet stores cared about health, but they do not... I've had several rodents purchased from them have severe health problems and die within a week

Originally Posted by SundayCrepes

After the birth couldn't you just separate the sexes into different cages and let the kids keep their pets?

Good idea.. except that I know with rats, by the time you can accurately tell sex, it's sometimes too late And male rats have ginormous testicles by the time they're about 6wks old (ok ginormous relative to body size


OP, why not just get a few young mice or rats (I totally recommend rats honestly, they are larger and more comfortable being handled by kids... mice are very skittish) so that the children can watch them grow and develop? 5 week old rats are fairly small still, but totally loveable

[elizawill]

at a local pet store in my area (locally owned and small), we've seen many times that their mice will have babies there (tiny, hairless, newborn babies). maybe you could work out a field trip or class visit from a pet store perhaps when they have newborns to share? just a thought

as for breeding the mice, i would only do that if you could find them homes. we have 2 fancy mice and they make the most delightful pets. they are so gentle and sweet... is that a possibility?

ETA - we do the embryology program through 4-H each year and raise chickens and quail. it is so much fun! through our branch, we have the option of keeping the chickens after they've been hatched (or returning them)...so i give them to my neighbor for eggs. is that an option? it is so hands-on because the kids have to rotate the eggs daily and watching them hatch is so much fun! the chicks are so cute & fun to play with too.

[elizawill]

Originally Posted by CariOfOz

OP, why not just get a few young mice or rats (I totally recommend rats honestly, they are larger and more comfortable being handled by kids... mice are very skittish)

i agree that rats are better pets (they're just smarter). but our fancy mice are so sweet and aren't skittish at all. my little girl carries them on her shoulder everywhere and they love it! they were very easy to tame, and unlike hamsters and gerbils, our mice have never tried to bite.

guinea pigs are great too, but IME they require a lot more care.

[JulieNicole23]

Originally Posted by elizawill

i agree that rats are better pets (they're just smarter). but our fancy mice are so sweet and aren't skittish at all. my little girl carries them on her shoulder everywhere and they love it! they were very easy to tame, and unlike hamsters and gerbils, our mice have never tried to bite.

guinea pigs are great too, but IME they require a lot more care.

We have a gerbil, and she has never tried to bite Hamsters are a different story all together! They definitely bite! We have had guinea pigs in the past too...they will not bite, however they do require more care (the cages they sell in the stores are way too small) and they are loud too...

I would also be careful breeding rodents for the kids to watch...we bred rats in biology class in jr high, and the parents ate the babies...

[OkiMom]

Honestly I wouldn't mainly because my girls get attached to pets really quickly and it would be heartbreaking to them to get attached to the animal and lose them.

[Ravin]

Honestly, we have a gerbil (used to have 2) that wound up ours because a friend had an overpopulation problem (which slowed once I showed her eldest how to sex the critters, and stopped once they all got sick with something and died). I've told DD no more rodent pets. I'm not fond of gerbils--we can't handle Bagel, she bites (bit friend's son, used to handling the things, very hard once and I won't take the chance). I've told DD no more rodent pets. Ever.

I'd consider raising a litter of rabbits, not as pets but for food. Slaughtering the lot of them would be the end of the experiment, after seeing them breed. I would only do this while making it clear to the children that it was the plan from the beginning. If I was going to do it with mice, I'd also make that clear from the beginning, and work out a deal with the neighbor for them (though I'd probably sell them frozen, not live) at a fraction of what he's having to pay whatever pet store he buys them from normally, and let the kids keep the profits, if there are any after cage, food, bedding, and the original breeding pair are paid for. I'd also consider doing some mendelian genetics experiments, by getting unlike parents and keeping track of traits inherited in the crosses and maybe doing a few litters of cross as well as line breeding. But probably not until at least middle school.

It could be an economics lesson as well as a biology experiment.

[Arduinna]

I don't really see the need to do a "class breeding project". Especially not for very young children and with mice, just to give them away. There are tons of other ways kids learn about reproduction. Like their friends getting siblings, or if you raise food animals.

[RiverSky]

Wow, that sounds like the worst idea I could ever imagine. How awful. Breeding creatures and then disposing of them just for your own entertainment (edutainment? not even).

There are plenty of videos on the internet. Watch some. Read some books. I just don't see any need to bring unwanted babies into the world just so you can figure out some way to pawn them off on others. Ugh.

Or volunteer for a cat or dog rescue by fostering pregnant animals, or fostering orphaned babies. Your children will quickly learn why the lives of mammals like cats, dogs, rodents are not just learning moments.

[zjande]

Originally Posted by RiverSky

Wow, that sounds like the worst idea I could ever imagine. How awful. Breeding creatures and then disposing of them just for your own entertainment (edutainment? not even).

There are plenty of videos on the internet. Watch some. Read some books. I just don't see any need to bring unwanted babies into the world just so you can figure out some way to pawn them off on others. Ugh.

Or volunteer for a cat or dog rescue by fostering pregnant animals, or fostering orphaned babies. Your children will quickly learn why the lives of mammals like cats, dogs, rodents are not just learning moments.

I'm sorry to hear that you are feeling grumpy & judgmental today. I hope that tomorrow is better for you.

I just wanted to toss a reminder out there that there is no black & white to all this. That snake is going to eat some mice, whether she provides them or someone else does. Our pet dogs & cats? They are all eating the ground up corpses of the sickest, probably neglected, and definitely unhappy factory farmed animals. Raising eggs for a class project? If they eggs came from a hatchery, the hatchery grinds up or suffocates most of their newborn male layers because they have no purpose. What will become of the males hatched from the classroom experiment? Does anyone really believe the nice farmer they are donated to isn't going to chop their heads off & eat them? Did you drink any milk or eat any cheese today? You directly supported the veal industry. Veal calves are the male babies born to dairy cows. Since they can't make milk, we came up with the idea of veal instead of just drowning them (or grinding them up like those male layer chicks). Have you ever bought a pet in your life? You are supporting the "breeding of animals for our entertainment". Do you eat vegetables? Millions of rodents, lizards & birds die every year when the fields are plowed......

I am absolutely not trying to begin a debate. I really sincerely only wanted to point out that raising a few mice & then feeding them to a snake seems pretty darn peaceful & miniscule to me, compared to all the horrors in our food industry (our food & the food we feed our pets). And that none of us are innocent! So we should try to avoid being terribly judgmental.

The question the OP would have to ask herself is whether she is OK with her kids getting the message that we humans sometimes raise animals to become food for others.

All that being said, I did foster pregnant mama cats for years & it was soooo fun. I recommend it to anyone that is able to do such a thing!