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Frozen mice?

L

Lesley1960

New member
Hi, I hope this doesn't sound a silly question, but how long can you freeze mice for? I know some people feel that once something is frozen it's ok for a very long time. I personally don't like to keep any human food frozen for much longer than 3 months, so am doing the same for my corn. Am I being a bit over the top?
 
I'm not sure "exact" lengths of time, but I keep most of my mice/rats in my big chest freezers that way they're not being exposed to *open/close/open/close* that normal fridge freezers experience. I feed my littles more often so those mice are in the fridge freezer, but I've noticed that all of the mice/rats tend to keep pretty well in the deep freeze.
 
Yes I do keep in chest freezer which is not used daily. I buy 6 at a time and he is fed one large mouse every 2 weeks so they last 12 weeks. I would like to buy more but worried they'll spoil and I definitely don't want to give him bad food.
 
I would go ahead and buy more if it is cost effective. I have mice in my freezer that I use a Ziploc sealer with so they are "vacuum packed", and are over 6 months old.

If your freezer ever fails and the temps are warm enough to thaw the mice, then they are no good and I would toss them. Otherwise they are good to go, I have had a couple with a bit of frostbite on them but the snakes never minded.
 
So long as they are kept frozen, they won't "spoil" in the sense of decomposition. The bacteria and enzymes will either be dead or inhibited. When we talk about food "spoiling" in the freezer, we are usually talking about damage in the texture and taste of the food which makes it unpleasant to eat, but doesn't mean you'll get sick doing so.

The issus with keeping any food for long periods of time in the freezer is oxidation and dehydration, freezer burn, both or which are caused by exposure to air. Oxidation is less of an issue here (talking about whole animals not steaks), but things in the freezer will slowly lose moisture to the surrounding air.

To prevent dehydration, and the food from becoming the worst kind of meat jerky, keep food in SEALED packages with LITTLE AIR (either pushed out, or vacuum sealed if you're fancy) and REDUCE EXPOSURE to new air (don't open and reseal it a bunch of times).
 
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