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"fighters keep going beyond reason", is that not idiotic in itself?
Mice as food for Tarantulas advice please?
- Thread starter Imegnixs_Cinder
- Start date
Sooo, you choose to keep pets that need to consume other animals or insects that are lower on the food chain to live and you are all bantering about the most humane way to feed them? <blinks> seriously??? A tarantula is an opportunist and in the wild it is going to eat what ever it can get a hold of and overpower. So because it is not in the wild but in an enclosure in your house you are going to find a humane way to feed them to satisfy your own moral compass? When you start throwing around the inhumane accusations and pointing the cruelty finger because someone feeds live mice or saying that we need to start prekilling feeder insects you have pretty much hopped on the PETA train to crazyville. If you dont want to feed mice to tarantulas, don't. If you want to prekill all your insect feeders, do it. Your tarantula won't be morally cleansed, in fact I can pretty confidently say that it doesn't care. I won't deny that insects have a nervous system or that they have a inclination for self preservation but I don't really care. If that makes me a bad person, fine I'm a bad person. I gotta go now and do some bad person stuff.
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Then there's yet another "moral" issue for those concerned about the "humanity" of how a feeder takes its last breath....if you pre-kill, now you take that away from the t, but now its on you...So by that rational, its more humane for me to kill them first? Yet there are times I go to kill small crickets for slings, and think they are dead, only to have them twitching or moving again once put in the enclosure....when a t grabs them, they are actually more successful (like 100%), as I am trying to kill them in a manner to keep them as intact as possible as feeders...sure I could just squish it or splatter it, but then its harder, if not impossible to use as a feeder.
The single most shocking thing about this thread is the fact that such a hotly debated subject was somehow able to go dormant for 4 and a half YEARS...lol.
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Ziolizard
Arachnosquire
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I came here to get information about whether or not it's healthy to feed my adult female Lasiodora difficilis a mouse, and I find a pissing contest. Lovely. Moderators, can we shut this thing down and leave it at Stan Schultz' informative comment, complete with sources? That's all this thread really needed.
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It sure is, and yet it happens all the time. In physical fights its' a person's adrenaline carrying them on, despite severe injuries. In threads like this, it's both parties beating the dead rodent until even a tarantula wouldn't want it any more.
scorpionchaos
Arachnosquire
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Hmmm what is this? Quick hand me my brush... *brushing noises*... MY GOD! It's a fossil!
Sorry I could't resist this thread is like 4 years old!
It is very likely that in nature a large tarantula will snack on a rodent it grabbed, it's a mathematical impossibility to say it hasn't (considering the amount of tarantulas in an area compared to the number of rodents and the fact that WE KNOW they eat them in captivity is pretty much an answer in its self. I think it does happen and should happen in captivity occasionally. HOWEVER! I also believe that matching animals in a contained environment to feed one isn't right. Don't tell me it happens in nature, I'd be very surprised if you found an A.geniculata in a 5 gallon closed tank with a mouse to munch on in south Americas rainforest. We know tarantulas eat dead things so why bother risking our T's lives and making the mice suffer? Just by a frozen pinky thaw it out and a make a staring incision so they know it's there, it's that simple! Also don't tell me it's need to chase a mouse every now and then, that's what crickets are for! The thing I have yet to see be considered is when a t strikes a rodent with its fangs, what would happen if it struck bone? Would the fang not be chipped or snapped?
Crickets and mice can be compared and cannot be compared in some situations. They do have brains but cannot think like you and I or a mouse. It makes them harder to relate to and understand therefor they tend to be treated like minorities in the kingdom of living things. But they have the same energy as every living thing on the planet, how they live, think, eat, drink and reproduce is irrelevant. They are full of life as is every living thing, they deserve the same respect for that reason. I not trying to start a free the cricket motion here, just saying a life is a life and that should be addressed. Not prevented or anything but I think it should be acknowledged. As a hunter myself I don't just kill kill kill, I take a life to supply another as is natural but I don't want my quarry to suffer, I try to make it a clean shot for a quick death. Am I PETA? No. Do I believe in animal cruelty. No. Do I accept that nature is not a forgiving thing and that some creature must suffer to keep others from the same suffering? Yes!
I personally don't believe in suffering when it's not needed. It bothers me to think there are people who do. It's needed in nature to keep prey from escaping. In captivity it's needed to create some activity. But when you compare a cricket and a mouse side by side being munched on a cricket, you'll notice the crickets suffer less. It's not alive nearly as long as the mouse. The cricket is crushed while the mouse is injected and subdued. When it's in the wild great, when it's in a box...
There's a balance in life of respect for prey and predator regardless of what either of those are.
Over all from a nutritious point of view I think it's fine but to much of something is rarely good for you. I think rodent for tarantula is good in moderation like anything else. It seems to be more of safety issue than a nutritional problem IMO. I wish somebody would just do a freaking study and shut us all up!
One thing I guarantee is your tarantula does not care as much as you do!
Sorry I could't resist this thread is like 4 years old!
It is very likely that in nature a large tarantula will snack on a rodent it grabbed, it's a mathematical impossibility to say it hasn't (considering the amount of tarantulas in an area compared to the number of rodents and the fact that WE KNOW they eat them in captivity is pretty much an answer in its self. I think it does happen and should happen in captivity occasionally. HOWEVER! I also believe that matching animals in a contained environment to feed one isn't right. Don't tell me it happens in nature, I'd be very surprised if you found an A.geniculata in a 5 gallon closed tank with a mouse to munch on in south Americas rainforest. We know tarantulas eat dead things so why bother risking our T's lives and making the mice suffer? Just by a frozen pinky thaw it out and a make a staring incision so they know it's there, it's that simple! Also don't tell me it's need to chase a mouse every now and then, that's what crickets are for! The thing I have yet to see be considered is when a t strikes a rodent with its fangs, what would happen if it struck bone? Would the fang not be chipped or snapped?
Crickets and mice can be compared and cannot be compared in some situations. They do have brains but cannot think like you and I or a mouse. It makes them harder to relate to and understand therefor they tend to be treated like minorities in the kingdom of living things. But they have the same energy as every living thing on the planet, how they live, think, eat, drink and reproduce is irrelevant. They are full of life as is every living thing, they deserve the same respect for that reason. I not trying to start a free the cricket motion here, just saying a life is a life and that should be addressed. Not prevented or anything but I think it should be acknowledged. As a hunter myself I don't just kill kill kill, I take a life to supply another as is natural but I don't want my quarry to suffer, I try to make it a clean shot for a quick death. Am I PETA? No. Do I believe in animal cruelty. No. Do I accept that nature is not a forgiving thing and that some creature must suffer to keep others from the same suffering? Yes!
I personally don't believe in suffering when it's not needed. It bothers me to think there are people who do. It's needed in nature to keep prey from escaping. In captivity it's needed to create some activity. But when you compare a cricket and a mouse side by side being munched on a cricket, you'll notice the crickets suffer less. It's not alive nearly as long as the mouse. The cricket is crushed while the mouse is injected and subdued. When it's in the wild great, when it's in a box...
There's a balance in life of respect for prey and predator regardless of what either of those are.
Over all from a nutritious point of view I think it's fine but to much of something is rarely good for you. I think rodent for tarantula is good in moderation like anything else. It seems to be more of safety issue than a nutritional problem IMO. I wish somebody would just do a freaking study and shut us all up!
One thing I guarantee is your tarantula does not care as much as you do!
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I am just gonna say this, I went outside yesterday night to catch some crickets to feed to my WC spiders and scorps. I caught a lot of crickets, I used feeding tongs and didn't try to keep them alive. I purposefully grabbed them by the head of the middle of the body, often times resulted in it crushing or tearing into said part. I also ripped the legs off most of them to feed to the smaller inverts. Take what you guys want from that but I guess I am an evil person.
Never did I claim to be outraged. Someone said, "Don't you think such and such is wrong," and I said, "Yes, and I think such and such argument supporting it is stupid."
The difference between brain and ganglion is ENTIRELY arbitrary. I was fully aware that there is a cluster of nerves in crickets' heads. You could, theoretically, argue that any anteriorly-positioned ganglion should be termed a "brain." So whilst I greatly appreciate that you actually read scientific papers, I'd ALSO appreciate it if you didn't let this devolve into ad hominem attacks. I CAN start citing papers on nociception and flight responses in hexapods, if you so desire.
---------- Post added 10-14-2014 at 12:27 AM ----------
We more or less agree on everything here. Thank you for adding your voice to the discussion. As a hunter, I think your voice is particularly valuable, as you make an argument for being cognizant of a prey animal's well-being without being a member of PETA.
---------- Post added 10-14-2014 at 12:28 AM ----------
Lol. You have a good point. I already said I gave up. Other people kept posting. I responded in kind.
---------- Post added 10-14-2014 at 12:30 AM ----------
The Schultzes address the ethical considerations behind feeding mice in their book. They don't say they're dead-set against it, but they do say, "here are some things to think about." I think it's very much relevant to the discussion.
---------- Post added 10-14-2014 at 12:36 AM ----------
So... You're attacking me for what, exactly? Turning a critical eye to my behaviour as an animal keeper and analysing things? If you wanna go about your life not thinking about anything you do and just doing it, go ahead. I made an argument for something. I didn't say we *should* pre-kill insects, I said it follows logically from this line of thought that OTHER people are bringing forward. I keep tarantulas. I highly doubt they care if they get a mouse or a hornworm. I don't even know if they have the capacity to. Chances are they'll be pleased as punch to eat a mouse that's already dead anyways.
freedumbdclxvi
Arachnoprince
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Browncoat, I would very much like those citations.
I respect all your opinions. I think we should be able to sit down as hobbyists and discuss and justify all the ethical aspects of keeping the animals we keep. If we can't do that, and analysing our behaviour is "stupid" or makes one a "member of PETA," then I think it just gives ammunition to people like PETA. Remember, PETA is pretty damn popular, whereas a lot of people just see us as a bunch of weirdos who like spiders. I have no more energy to discuss this, but I'll try to get you some literature to read tomorrow, freedumbclxvi, when I've had a good night's sleep (I'm pretty tired).
I don't think PETA are very powerful at all, for a group that size they really haven't done much apart from change a few minor laws and shut down a few pig/chicken farms etc *ooh so scary* These are the members of PETA in a nutshell , bunch of Uni kids who have no idea how the real world works, bored house wives and some hippies from the commune, what a scary line up.
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Never seen the need when we have large species of roach. A well fed, adult female Blaptica dubia fattens up post-molt females just fine. Have you ever thought about getting yourself a colony of Macropanesthia rhinoceros or any other of your large, native roach species?
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Not true. I've raised Theraphosa stirmi (that are larger than any species you'll ever own unless you relocate) to breeding adults on nothing more than crickets and the occasional hisser.
I just meant that the "animal rights" people are growing in strength every day, and threaten the hobby that we love. Oh, they'll probably start with exotic mammal and reptile keepers, but I'm sure eventually they'll work their way to spiders.
Here is some stuff that free dumbclxvi wanted:
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00610967#page-1
The fact that the cockroaches failed to respond after moulting seems indicative that the response is controlled by the organ itself.
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4684-7281-3_1
Note that these authors do not refer to an insect "brain," but to a "cephalic ganglion," which is what I did.
http://ac.els-cdn.com/S006528060860...t=1413300996_a133233213ddfe1d6897acb125fbc8de
Whilst it wasn't clear, at least when this article was written, it seems that octopamine is released directly by the metathoracic ganglion.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01963580?LI=true#page-1
Whilst the authors recommend "caution," they conclude that we don't have evidence that insects feel "pain."
freedumbdclxvi
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Thanks for posting.