killing small animals

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Helen_T

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We had this topic last weekend among a grou of friends:

When you are disturbed by small animals, such as bugs, spiders, centipedes, snails and slugs…and so on… - in house or garden - do you kill those animals or not ? and if the answer is yes: do you kill them while children are present and watching - or do you pick a moment when no children are near you ?

Last question: if the answer is yes - do you use a killing method that lets the animal suffer as less as possible ?
 
What strange questions. Of course I kill them if they are causing a nuisance and are not an endangered species. If small children are poresent I wencourage them to watch to see that these things are not so terrifying. And whilst it’s usually better to kill things quickly, there is no convincing evidence that invertebrates feel pain, and some such as slugs and leeches can be amazingly hard to kill.
 
I remember we had a similar topic a few years ago, but can’t find the link right now.

Yes use to kill insects in our house when ever i find them. I usually try to manage them onto a hard kind of floor and quickly step on them and crush them to death under my shoe - so they don’t suffer.

But i think i avoid this kind of work when small children are near me.
 
When I read this thread title, I immediately thought of Chipmunks, squirrels, mice, rabbits, etc. That is what comes to my mind when someone says small animals. Not the common house fly or ants.

I have no problem killing an insect that is harmful. I would not harm a small animal.
 
I haven’t met a little boy who isn’t thrilled with killing bugs. 😃

As someone who lives in the country I also wouldn’t have a problem killing varmit like moles and mice.

Bigger rodents like rats, squirrels and flying vertebrates like birds and bats, however, is where I draw the line. This day and age you can easily protect your house and yard against them. (Moles still tear up lawns and dig under foundations and mice can get into a crack less than 1/8inch)

I also found that killing bugs (like mosquitos & black flies) in the presance of children to be a positive thing and reinforce that you’re an adult protecting them. As another person posted dealing with a bug appropriately can also be a teaching moment.
 
last summer I killed a rattlesnake on my sidewalk in front of my grandchildren. I had no qualms regarding killing a rattlesnake, killing it in front of the children or how long it took to kill it, unfortunately I missed the head on the first strike. It is just something that needs to be done. The kids knew they were in danger and that I was taking care of them, not calling daddy or screaming or whatever else could have wasted time and given it a chance to escape and become a worse danger to everyone.

In my opinion, this is being overthought. Sometimes things just have to be done as efficiently as possible.
 
I do kill spiders and bugs when I see them, and if the kids see them first I will instruct them to kill them quick. If we don’t get to them first the cat will and that is not quick and painless. Sometimes I wished I had the guts to kill mice quick, but I don’t and so we try to catch them live and release them, unfortunately this is not easy and the cats will kill them for us.
 
purplesunshine said:
I haven’t met a little boy who isn’t thrilled with killing bugs. 😃
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Boy don’t I know it. I have 2 boys and would love to stomp on a fire ant or two. And heck my 6 y/o DD told me once “Caterpillars have green guts… I know cause I stepped on one”
I mean that one came from out of the blue and we all laughed about.

But, on the serious side I have a garden and I also teach my children about the beneficial insects and they will go out of their way to gather them up and take them to the garden.

And as for the bad ones…well they usually meet the underside of a tennis shoe and then the shoe is lifted for an inspection of curiosity of what color the “guts” are!😃

Bottom line… teach them about both the good ones and the bad ones. You teach them to avoid dangerous things and some small insects and small animals are dangerous. Teach them to avoid these and as a resort of either getting away or being stung or bitten… teach them to kill them quickly and safely if needed.

Paul
 
I also don’t view insects as small animals. I kill them when they get inside my home. I teach my children that outside is their habitat and we leave them alone, but inside is a different matter. Both my girls are very squeamish about bugs, so I have to put on a brave face and get rid of whatever creepy-crawly made its way indoors. Quite a feat, since I really don’t like bugs either.
 
I try not to kill anything unless it is threatening my life or the life of my family members. I catch and release spiders and insects in the house (with a cup and an index card, usually).
 
A few years ago my cat was chasing a hornet, and having been stung by one I knew how painful and long lasting the effects could be. I didn’t want her to get stung in the mouth, especially.

So I grabbed a book and smacked it. Since it was on a carpet, it didn’t die. I had to keep smacking it, and honestly, I felt awful.

If it had been a one smack smash, it would have been ok, but to have to keep up trying to kill a creature was a terrible experience.

I have to say I learned something, though, as I usually try to apply something like this to life in general.

What must it feel like to kill a larger creature, or a human? How do abortionists live with themselves, day after day?
 
athansor said:
I try not to kill anything unless it is threatening my life or the life of my family members. I catch and release spiders and insects in the house (with a cup and an index card, usually).
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Me too. DH prefers me to do it. 😉

The only exception is mosquitoes. When one bites, I’ll squash it. I call it self defense. 🤷
 
Small animals I don’t intentionally kill…but I also consider those to be mice, chipmunks, etc.

Now insects? If they are in my home, they die. I don’t care if the kids see me or not. DS likes killing bugs himself, anyway. The only inside insects we won’t kill are ladybugs, skeeter eaters, moths and daddy longlegs.

Outside, we don’t kill them. That’s their space; inside is mine. I won’t let my kids intentionally kill outdoor bugs.

PS - I didn’t vote because I don’t kill small animals, but I think the OP means here “bugs”, and my answer changes depending on what he means.
 
Now that I think about it, and have posed that more serious question, I have no problem with killing mosquitos.

And fleas and ticks-- they’re evil! 😉
 
I my self haven’t killed anything but insects, however both my parents grew up on the farm. My mother’s job was to chop the heads off the chickens. 🤷 Not a big deal they needed to eat the chickens. One time when she was gardening behind the house and found mice nesting up against the foundation with a bunch of baby mice, still blind. So she ended up killing them with the hoe she was gardening with. (pretty quick) When she got back in she felt really bad because the baby’s had been “crying” for their mother.
My parents also have a vegetable garden in the back and we have a terrible time with rabbits. He keeps a bebe gun at the ready so he can shoot the rabbits. I don’t have a problem with this. (I use to have an uncle who raised rabbits and one day we were there while he was skinning a rabbit. :eek:) Anyways the one time that did bother me is my Dad found a nest of baby rabbits under the porch. (they were big enough they had fur and could get around). He ended up following the bunnies around the yard and killing them. I understand that if left to grow up they could breed and lead to even more rabbits. But still baby bunnies are cute. :o
 
I think we somehow justify or rationalize killing and even the way humans treat creatures. I know someone who insists that animals don’t feel pain, and since they are “dumb” and “stupid” that somehow makes it ok.
She says things like “turkeys are so dumb they don’t know when to come in from the rain.”
And “squirrels are too stupid to get out of the road, they deserve to die.”

I watched a video once with lab animals being tortured in experiments. If they don’t feel pain, why would they scream and try to get away? These people nailed a guinea pig to a board and then tried different “pain killer” medicines on it. Hunh?

Now they are proving that animal “intelligence” is just not measured the same way human intelligence is.

When I used to ride horses, the teacher told us horses are stupid and don’t feel pain. Now I know he said that to justify hitting them. He would whip them mercilessly, saying their flesh us so tough they can’t feel it. I asked him why they twitched when flies landed on them, and he thought I was stupid.
Later I read that doctors believed mental patients felt no pain. People will say anything to rationalize their behavior toward helpless or weak people and animals.

I had pet mice as a kid, and the babies, called “pups” really do cry and squeak when they’re hungry. It was fascinating to me, because they have all the same organs we do, only teeny tiny. Mice are the smallest mammal.

I think they’re awesome. Actually, I think their Creator is awesome.

I hope I don’t get in trouble for moving this topic up a notch. Or more…
 
I consider insects “animals” only in the broadest sense, since they don’t meet the criteria for being vegetables or minerals. Of course I will kill insects, arachnids, and arthropods if they get into my house, esp. the ones with potential to do serious damage to my home (I had carpenter ants in one house, ugh!), to inflict pain or cause injury with their stings/bites, or to spread infectious diseases. I treat my cats with one of those topical remedies to kill fleas, ticks, etc. I don’t bother with the insects outdoors, though, unless it’s a hornet’s nest or something.

Having grown up in the country, I have no qualms about killing rodents. People would shoot the woodchucks because of their burrows — a cow or horse could step in one of those holes and break a leg. And nobody wants rats in their barn. Now, living in the city, my cats will kill any rodents that might get into the house. I did have an infestation of ground squirrels a few years ago, and had to set traps to kill those. They are cute little things, but can be very destructive.

But the only times I have actively, deliberately killed an animal myself have been when it was suffering, to put it out of its misery. One time I had set a mouse trap in the shed (where the cats don’t have access) and a mouse was caught but not dead, so I drowned it in a coffee can full of water rather than letting it die a slow, miserable death. Another time, a bird flew into the back window hard enough that it was lying there twitching with one side paralyzed, so I dropped a big brick on it to finish it off. Eeeeuwwww!

So, you folks who won’t kill a mouse or a bug are vegetarians, right? I’m just wondering…😉
 
Of course you want to dispatch an animal as quickly and as humanely as possible. And I teach the kids to treat all animals with dignity and respect, even if they’re being killed. Some animals are our friends (like honey bees) and some are not (like squash bugs).

I don’t kill bugs or other insects outside unless they cause damage, like the ones that destroy the garden. Bugs get killed in the house, especially june bugs…we have the brown recluse, so spiders in the house are always killed.

If the kids’ dad is hunting, he doesn’t care if the kids are around or not. It’s up to them.
 
We’re currently dealing with ants in our apartment, so death is the name of the game. I don’t want them to suffer, so I try to crush them quickly, but there’s no way to actually “catch and release” a couple dozen ants on your kitchen wall.

Sam, the Neon Orange Knight
 
Ne_OrangeKnight said:
We’re currently dealing with ants in our apartment, so death is the name of the game. I don’t want them to suffer, so I try to crush them quickly, but there’s no way to actually “catch and release” a couple dozen ants on your kitchen wall.

Sam, the Neon Orange Knight
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I find that if you use Terro ant killer, that works the best and it is really fast. In about a day you wont have any more ants. But you have to let the ants make the trail to the poison so that they take it back to the nest.
 
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