Frozen rats

[Anastasia]

Hi everyone,

Was wondering where you all buy your frozen rats from. I had placed an order with Southern Biological last week but they rang me just now to say their supply of frozen rats was not as abundant as in the past and they could not tell me when and how many they would be able to get at any one given time. Has anyone else had this problem? Also how do you go with rats preserved in formalin being used by junior classes as the CSIS states for use by 11-12.

Anastasia

[Narelle01]

i was directed towards westmead hospital to purchase rats.
They are 'hospital research grade' and are considered safe to use.

That said, i have told me staff at my previous school, and this school, that as a lab assistant, I am not prepared to source, purchase and then prepare for dissection, rats. Its one thing I cannot do. I directed them towards the animal policy for them to read.

[dime]

We got the rats in formalin many years ago. I don't know how the students cut 'em up for the smell of formalin is awful. Ring around the pet shops in your area, as the one here in a country town has them all the time in the freezer as feed for pet smakes. They are a little smaller that the ones we used to get from Newcastle Univ but the teacher said they were fine. They might have been $6 or $8 ea, which was a little steep I thought, but then again they were available locally and easily. A pet shop somewhere is sure to have them. Good Luck

[Narelle01]

I had another thought about this this morning, Rats dissection is not on the current syllabus - thats my other excuse for not doing it!

[merilyn]

I'm with you on that Narelle, don't want to go down that street at all - sourcing them and then the hassle of disposing of them. It's true, rat dissection is not in the syllabus so it is a big expense for something the kids don't have to do. Glad my teachers here don't want to do it "just for fun"!

[Anastasia]

Thanks all for your replies, from another source I have just found out that whole animal dissections are generally not to be done in schools according to the Animal Welfare act 2004 section 6 and if schools insist on doing them they need to apply to the Ethics Comitttee for approval. So that does it for us, no more rat dissections!