ANY-maze Help > The ANY-maze reference > The Protocol page > The elements of a protocol > Additional information > Animal weights > Specifying whether you'll be recording animal weights and if so when you'll be weighing the animals

Specifying whether you'll be recording animal weights and if so when you'll be weighing the animals

In brief

Use the options on the Animal weights settings page to specify whether you want to weigh your animals, and if so, when you want to weigh them.

Choosing whether to weigh your animals

You should use the buttons to specify whether you want to weigh your animals. The options are:

The first of these is the default, and means that ANY-maze won't record your animals' weights.

The second option means you will record just a single weight for each animal. When you'll weigh the animal is something you'll specify using the next set of options on the page (see below), so you don't need to worry about that when answering this question, the key point is that you'll only have a single weight for the animal for the entire experiment. This is typically what you'd choose when your experiment will be performed over a short period of time.

The third option means you'll be able to record multiple weights for each animal. This is typically what you'll choose when you experiment lasts for a long enough period of time that the animals' weights may change.

Choosing when to weigh the animals

You should use the buttons to specify when in the experiment you want to weigh you animals. The options are:

Below these options is a list of all the stages in the experiment.

If you choose the first option then you will need to weigh all the animals in the experiment before you perform any of the trials in the specified stage (or stages). This is useful when you need to weigh the animals some time before testing them, for example, in order to calculate their treatment doses (because the treatment needs to be administered some time before testing begins).

The second option means you'll weigh each animal immediately before its first trial in the selected stage or stages. If you specified that you'll only record a single weight for each animal then you will only be able to choose a single stage, otherwise you'll be able to choose multiple stages. You can select any stages, so for example, in a water-maze experiment you might want to weigh the animals before their first probe trial, but not before their first training trial. Weighing animals immediately before their tests has the benefit that you are already handling the animal, so it's quick and easy to pop the animal onto the scales before placing it in the apparatus.

The third option is much like the second, except that in this case you'll weigh the animal before every trial in the stages, or stages, that you select. This is typically only required when there is a significant period between the trials of the stage.

Converting a protocol in which you used to record animal weights in a field

In previous versions of ANY-maze, you could record animal weights by setting up an appropriate field. You may therefore already have an experiment or  protocol in which you've set up a field to record the animal's weight. In this case, if you select one of the above options to record animal weights, ANY-maze will detect that you may already be recording the weight in a field and prompt you to select any existing 'weight' field, using the window shown below. It will then automatically convert the field (and any data you have already entered) to use the new Animal weights setting you have chosen.

Figure 1. This window is displayed if there are already any numeric fields defined in your protocol - you can specify which field to use (or tell ANY-maze that none of the existing fields are used to measure animal weights).

Editing your choice

You can change these options at any time, even during an experiment, however there can be some repercussions:

See also:

© Copyright 2003-2026 Stoelting Co. All rights reserved

ANY-maze help topic T0593