Ah, Thanksgiving. Family is arriving, food is cooking and the game is on. There are tons of great things about this marvelous and gluttonous holiday but it seems one thing gets slightly looked over during the day… your pet’s health!
There are several Thanksgiving pet dangers that rear their ugly head during this holiday - here is how you can avoid them and prevent a trip to the vet! Keep fido out of the kitchen
From personal experience with the more athletically inclined pooches, counter-surfing is a very real occurrence. Our Australian shepherd once hopped right up on the counter and started helping himself to the made and partially-made dishes. Obviously, you see how this is one of the more common Thanksgiving pet dangers. Contrary to popular belief dogs cannot eat everything, and they get sick with raw foods just like we do. No one wants to induce vomiting in your dog in front of friends and family. Simply keep your pooch out of the kitchen.
Don’t let friends and family feed your pets
I know it’s hard to resist those puppy-or-kitty-eyes, but make sure your guests know the house rules. Your guests may not know the safe and unsafe foods for pets, or if your pets have sensitive tummies. Politely fill your guests in on the dos and don’ts of feeding your pets table scraps! You don’t want them to be an accomplice for one of the most common Thanksgiving pet dangers.
Dangerous Thanksgiving foods:
There are several foods that may seem safe for your pets to eat, but are actually pretty bad for them, here’s a couple:
- Grapes and Raisins: Raisins are typically found in stuffing, cookies and other snacks. If your pet, especially dogs, eat grapes or raisins, these fruits can cause severe acute kidney injury. Signs of poisoning don’t typically show for a few days, until kidney failure has already taken place.
- Xylitol: We all love our sugar-free sweetners, well actually you shouldn’t because it’s all chemicals. I mean, would you rather have Xylitol, which sounds like an antidepressant, or sugar which is made of… sugar? I digress. Xylitol is extremely dangerous for dogs. When ingested it can result in a massive insulin spike, causing life threatening hypoglycemia and even liver failure in high doses. Xylitol is pretty prevalent in some packaged goods as well, so keep a lookout for baked goods, certain brands of peanut butter, gums, mints, chewable vitamins etc.
- Overly Fatty Table Scraps: We’re all guilty of this one, but the matter here is knowing what is good and bad to toss to your pup. Fatty table scraps like gravy, turkey skin, etc. are potentially dangerous for your mutt, depending on their size especially. Overly fatty scraps may cause severe pancreatitis. Breeds like miniature schnauzers, Shetland sheepdogs, and Yorkies are especially sensitive.
- Bones & Turkey Legs: No No No No!!! Especially bird bones - do not feed these to your pets! These bones are particularly fragile and can cause splintering when bitten, resulting in cut up throats, mouths and intestines. If you want to throw the dog a bone, make sure they are the super thick kind with marrow you can get at the store - and keep a close eye on them while they are eating as well, just in case.
- Onion, leeks, chives & garlic: Cats are particularly sensitive to this one. While it does take large doses of these, it’s still a risk you don’t want to take. Pets can develop a severe anemia.
Even on a non-holiday it’s hard to keep our pets out of the trash bin. With the increased amounts of food-trash; trimmings, and flavorful wrappers (to dogs), plus not really paying attention - it’s easy for pets to sneak into the garbage. Potential problems from “garbage gut” include a slew of issues for pooches and cats too! Safest bet is to keep trash as elevated as possible and CLOSED.
Keeping these tips in mind will help relieve a lot of potential stress during the holidays. Most importantly they’ll keep our fuzzy family members safe!
