Killed my first rooster yesterday

[Tre3hugger]

Where do you get helium?

Places like Party City I think

 

[GreedySeedFeedy]

I've used the co method for badly deformed chicks before. Its extremely fast. I'd say any gas that disperses oxygen will work.

For butchering I use a cone. They calm down being held upside-down.

You have a pic of the dust bath last Joy box? Sorry had to label it.

I have used the CO on a chick before that was suffering and beyond saving. It was over fast, but the poor little guy panicked and gasped desperately and was clearly scared. Broke my heart, I hated it.

I didn't take a picture, but it's still assembled. I will happily take pictures for you and tell you how it was all set up when I get back to the old apt (we are in the middle of a move)

 

[Tre3hugger]

Well, first you need an airtight container with a hole in the bottom. Helium is lighter than air, and rises to the top of the box, pushing the air out downward. You need to replace ALL of the air inside of the box with pure helium to guarantee a quick death with no chance of winding up with a live, upset bird with brain damage. It's important that you use pure helium, and that you fill the entire container.Our birds are small, less than a lb, so we used about a 2x2 plastic box with a tight locking lid and a hole drilled about 2 inches from the bottom. Another hole was drilled near the top, and a hose was connected from the helium tank to the upper hole and sealed on airtight.

Next, we filled the box with fine sand just up to the level of the hole at the bottom. The sand is not necessary, but I chose to have it there so my rooster would be calm and happily splashing around until he lost consciousness. I was really worried he would be afraid, and I wanted to avoid this as best as I could.

We put the rooster inside the box and fed him a few mealworms, then waited for him to relax and get down to digging in the sand. The helium rushing into the box makes a hissing noise, so we had a few false starts as it would scare him and took a couple of times hearing it hiss (with the box lid off! Exposure has to be complete or not as all) before he stopped being bothered by it. Once he was used to it we put the lid on for good, and turned up the valve.

You can feel air rushing out of the bottom hole as the helium rushes in. Within 5 seconds of all the oxygen being pushed out of the box, his scratching in the sand slowed down and he just stood up and looked around for a few seconds calmly before closing his eyes. He was standing, and he did a couple of nods, like someone does when they start to fall asleep sitting in a chair and then fell over. At this point, it can be upsetting for you. The bird is no longer conscious, but lack of oxygen will cause an anoxic convusions. With our older hen that had cancer it was just 5 or 6 quick flaps and leg jerks, but the rooster flapped his wings at full speed for about 5 seconds before finally lying still. His eyes were closed the whole time and he didn't look alive/awake or make any noise or move in any meaningful way, but it was still a little scary to see.

After this, we plugged the lower hole in the box with blue tac and turned off the valve. We left the bird inside the chamber for a good twenty minutes to a half hour to be absolutely sure he wouldn't have to wake up, confused and scared with a brain injury. I then took him out and laid him on a newspaper to dress him.

I felt sad that his life had ended, and it was pretty hard for me, but I was glad I stayed by to watch closely so that I could be SURE that he was never scared, or in pain. My birds are not at any point walking meat to me, or egg dispensers to be thrown away once they are used up, they are thinking feeling creatures with favorite foods and personalities that deserve to be treated as well as possible, even when they can no longer continue to live a happy life. As much as this sucked to do, it was a huge relief that it wasn't anything like I had experienced before, which was absolutely horrible and not quick and painless like people always told me it would be.

Helium is an inert gas, and you can breathe inert gasses without being aware you are suffocating until you wake up in the hospital, or just never waking up to find out if you're unlucky enough nit to be spotted in time. What causes that desperate thirst for air when you hold your breath is not caused by lack of oxygen, but by the buildup of carbon dioxide. If you're able to exhale the carbon dioxide, you'll never get that feeling.

appreciate you taking the time to explain. Seems like a good option for people who don't want to cut

 

[GreedySeedFeedy]

Thanks for taking the time to type this out!

You are welcome!

 

[SueT]

Where do you get helium?

 

[GreedySeedFeedy]

Where do you get helium?

You can buy helium from party supply stores, they sell you some in a cannister for blowing up baloons. You can get enough to fill a 14x14 foot box for 50 bucks where I live. It absolutely has to be pure helium!!, No co and no oxygen to be mixed in, it has to be inert. CO causes a feeling of suffocating and fear, even if it's very short I still want to avoid that as much as possible. Oxygen mixed in with the helium can prolong their death.

 

[Cazook]

This is really interesting, thanks for posting. Sometimes a bird needs to be culled and I've done it before but always feel terrible about it. This seems a more humane method.

 

[GreedySeedFeedy]

If the text in that image is too small, you can see the full size picture in my dropbox, here

https://www.dropbox.com/s/417rzjbcahvomq2/helium_euthenasia.png?dl=0

Right click on the image, and click 'view image' to see the full size.