Jed, for reasons I won't and don't want to go into, my brother once drowned a litter of puppies. He thought he was doing the right thing, even though the vet had offered to do the job. He said later that it was the hardest thing he ever did -- this from someone who operated a machine gun on ambushes in 'Nam. After it was over he had a drink -- several of them, in fact. He wishes now that he'd taken up the vet's offer.