I've killed quite a few animals but no people
having run a small smallholding where we kept chickens, ducks and geese, bred pet rabbits and had several hunty cats. It's never pleasant but killing things is a necessary part of the lifestyle.
Hmmm let me see....

Had to finish off various birds because they'd been mauled half to death by badgers. Various other mercy killings too - if something's dying slowly and painfully and there's nothing that can be done to relieve it, I'll help it on its way. So far I've 'finished off' mice, rats, pigeons, partridges, rabbits, ducks, chickens, and a ferret.

Killed off several chickens because they were too old to lay any more eggs. Had a go at eating them but I might as well have made curried leather.

Had to kill a whole litter of baby rabbits because the buck had got to the mother (by chewing holes big enough to squeeze through in two pieces of chicken wire) and got her up the duff while she was still pregnant with the previous litter. She wasn't young and she'd have died and both litters would have starved otherwise.

I found a while back with birds that chopping their heads off with an axe is the most humane method I can use. Getting it wrong while breaking an animal's neck is not something I have any desire to repeat. Also you can cradle them and they think it's all OK and then suddenly they're gone, hopefully before they realise anything's amiss.

We bought our geese as one day old chicks and they thought we were all their mum. It took me and a friend all day to kill them because you have to gut and pluck them while they're still warm. At one point when I chopped the head off it spurted blood all over his face and into his mouth.

I could go on. Oh actually I have. Oh well!
(teasus likes tea, Sat 24 Dec 2011, 23:48, 2 replies)

How is the 9th sentence even possible?

(Falstaff's Spiritual Successor, Sun 25 Dec 2011, 2:53, closed)

with the rabbit?
Rabbits and cats and some other mammals can have more than one pregnancy on the go at the same time. People can too in very rare cases - I used to know two brothers who'd been born together yet one was premature and the other one late.

Most cat litters contain kittens from more than one father, apparently.
(teasus likes tea, Sun 25 Dec 2011, 13:15, closed)