Rat Alert!

March 02, 2013

It seemed just yesterday, (and it really was yesterday) that a bunch of bio lovers in our school actually dissected live rats! Yes, it's not a typo, they're LIVE! At least, up to the part where we cut open their membranes they were.. Three of them even persevered until we cut their windpipes. The three lucky people got to see a pumping heart and I got to touch them while they're beating!

Okay, the reason we dissect those poor rats is not because we enjoy torturing them to death (they were anaesthetised prior dissection) but we were studying the cardiovascular, digestive and urogenital system of a mammal, their structures anyway.. I do feel pity for the rats, but we treated them with the utmost dignity, and we respected their sacrifices.. Just to state the obvious I am an animal lover too.

It was my first time ever dissecting an animal, dissecting anything for that matter. Kids here get to dissect frogs and build fun DNA structures before leaving school while my former class did.. nothing! It was due to the extreme level of noisiness in our class, as claimed by our teacher. Anyway, it was a shame not to have much field work done during bio.

All I can say is that dissection is not for the faint hearted. You'll have to first overcome the fear of touching a rat before even dissecting it (for those who have a fear of rats). I admire the bravado shown by the girls who make up 85.71% of our number that the closest they got to freaking out were turning away from the pumping hearts, which most of them did not! Hats off for the girls~

I got two strokes of luck~ A good one which is my nose was stuck while dissecting the rat which spared me from the smell of its insides and a not so good one which is the power supply chose yesterday, of all days to go out! As a result, it became stuffy and smelly(for those who did not have sinus problems anyway) xD

Most of us didn't have problems dissecting the rats although it isn't half as easy as they showed on TV where the doctor cut people up like paper. We had to first pin the rats' legs to the board. I'm really grateful that they were anaesthetised before doing that for I won't have the guts to do it while they're wide awake. Having so much reluctance pinning a semi-conscious rat to a board, I really can't imagine how they could bring themselves to nail Jesus to the cross so many years ago.

We did quite well seeing that we finished 2 hours early before the expected time. We didn't went for the brains though I would dearly love to *sigh*. We spent the rest of our rare free time to properly bury the rats, now carcasses.

Next will be a stream of photos which, I would stress again, is NOT for the faint hearted. Viewers view at your own risk. Same goes for stalkers too (you'd thought I forgot, didn't you?).