Accidental animal crueltyI once invented a brilliant game - I'd sit at the top of the stairs and throw cat biscuits to the bottom. My cat would eat them, then I'd shake the box, and he would run up the stairs for more biscuits. Then - of course - I'd throw a biscuit back down to the bottom. I kept this going for about half an hour, amused at my little game, and all was fine until the cat vomited. I felt absolutely dreadful.
Have you accidentally been cruel to an animal?
This question has been revived from way, way, way back on the b3ta messageboard when it was all fields round here.
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rob, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 11:13)
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OK, flies this timeFurther to my cranefly freezing experiments below, I also once conducted a series of solvent-based tests on flies. We had quite a plague of bluebottles in the lab, so subjects for study were readily available, if not terribly easy to catch.
Anyway, the experimental procedure was to capture a fly, trap it under a suitably transparent vessel (a small evaporating dish was ideal) and then slide the enclosure onto a piece of filter paper dampened with a drop of solvent. The effect was noted.
I then tried to reawaken the dormant beasties.
The results, as I remember them, were that chloroform, dichloromethane and similar chlorinated solvents worked well to anaesthetise the flies, which would recover when exposed again to clean air.
Ehanol would also put them out, albeit more slowly, and I did apparently drown one in ethanol by using too much. Methanol was similar.
But acetone just caused them to go absolutely mental. They would buzz around violently and bounce off the sides of the glass. It didn't cause them to fall motionless like the other stuff. I think it must been a serious irritant because they seemed to be wiping their eyes too.
In fact, acetone was also effective at quickly reviving insects which I'd made dormant using chloroform or the like.
I should say that at the end of the experimental period, all remaining flies were killed by various means, including rolled up newspapers, fly spray and setting fire to the solvents. Which definitely wasn't accidental!
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K2k6 has a proper job these days, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:16,
3 replies)
EtherPlain old ether's the best for this thing. I remember doing breeding experiments back in school for GCSE with fruit flies and having to knock them out using ether. They woke up again later perfectly fine.
(, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 17:11, closed)
I thinkI probably used ether at one point as it was one off the solvents I had in the lab then.
It's nice and safe on humans too, apparently, although I am definitely not trying that one!
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K2k6 has a proper job these days, Fri 7 Dec 2007, 8:38,
closed)
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