nfb: dog owners: warning

[wolfdogs]

scary stuff folks

http://9news.com/acm_news.aspx?OSGNA...7-c589c01ca7bf

[Steel2686]

Wow... That is scary. I remember as a kid, giving my Irish Setter gum just to watch him get aggravated chewing it. I guess it wasn't sugarless.

[95TransAm]

Glad that the pooch made it out...not good the less.

For some reason, I never have given any of my dogs chocolate. I remember when I was young, I heard it from someone in my family saying how it's not good for dogs. It seems like it's just something that always stuck with me.

Anyone know the truth on dogs eating chocolate that would like to enlighten me?

[zebragirl83]

Glad that the pooch made it out...not good the less.

For some reason, I never have given any of my dogs chocolate. I remember when I was young, I heard it from someone in my family saying how it's not good for dogs. It seems like it's just something that always stuck with me.

Anyone know the truth on dogs eating chocolate that would like to enlighten me?

The theobromine and caffeine in chocolate contain methylxanthine alkaloids which cause the dogs central nervous system to be stimulated or higher blood pressure in the dog... can also cause frequent and uncontrolled urination, diarrhea, seizures in more advanced cases of this poisoning. Technically humans could be effected by the same things but we know when to stop, that's why children get sick when they eat too much chocolate!! Unfortunately for dogs, it's not necessarily them eating a piece of chocolate that's bad for them, it's the animal instinct that won't let them stop eating... humans stop before the levels reach lethal levels. Obviously, the bigger the dog, the more he has to eat to get sick or be killed, but I've read before that something like a 20 lb. dog, it only takes about a pound of chocolate to be lethal, and that's to be LETHAL that's not just making the dog really really sick!!! So 95TransAm, the answer to your question is yes, what people have been telling you is the truth, don't feed your dogs chocolate!!

[raroZ28]

weird... Something happened to my gf's cat. He wasn't physically hurt or anything, but he was stumbling around, hissing at nothing, when we went to grab him, he was waving his paws around trying to swipe, but missing. He was way off. Took him to the hospital and they just guessed he was poisoned. I wonder if it was the same thing. He isn't the same anymore. He's very mellow now, like a totally different cat. I think he might have some kind of brain damage.

[95TransAm]

The theobromine and caffeine in chocolate contain methylxanthine alkaloids which cause the dogs central nervous system to be stimulated or higher blood pressure in the dog... can also cause frequent and uncontrolled urination, diarrhea, seizures in more advanced cases of this poisoning. Technically humans could be effected by the same things but we know when to stop, that's why children get sick when they eat too much chocolate!! Unfortunately for dogs, it's not necessarily them eating a piece of chocolate that's bad for them, it's the animal instinct that won't let them stop eating... humans stop before the levels reach lethal levels. Obviously, the bigger the dog, the more he has to eat to get sick or be killed, but I've read before that something like a 20 lb. dog, it only takes about a pound of chocolate to be lethal, and that's to be LETHAL that's not just making the dog really really sick!!! So 95TransAm, the answer to your question is yes, what people have been telling you is the truth, don't feed your dogs chocolate!!

Tell me that all came off the top of your head and you didn't need to look that up. That's awesome you know bio like that....intelligence is our greatest tool. Thanks for the response...appreciate it

[zebragirl83]

haha... i had to look up whether methylxanthine was spelled with a z or an x, but yeah pretty much already knew it... I look up questions of science like y'all (and have started doing recently) look up questions about cars... The guys on here know so much because they've read about it... it's really no different to me... actually I consider most of the guys on here WAAAAY smarter about cars than I am about science...
I just told someone not to feed their dog chocolate once and they questioned why, and I couldn't give them a real answer and I wasn't sure if it was even true or not because I'd just heard it all my life too, so I looked it up...

[Roger in Kensington]

While my good friend and his family . . .

. . . were out at a Christmas party last December, their German shepherd ate a one pound box of milk chocolate. Didn't (quite) kill him, but it cost many hundreds of dollars to save him.

Most milk chocolate contains so little actual chocolate that a dog is unlikely to suffer any severe aftereffects from one piece; a whole box is another matter.

Dark chocolate, on the other hand, contains far more actual chocolate than milk chocolate. And even relatively small amounts of Baker's (unsweetened) chocolate can severely affect a dog. The stuff tastes bitter to you and me, but dog's think it's great. Then they die.

[wolfdogs]

. . . were out at a Christmas party last December, their German shepherd ate a one pound box of milk chocolate. Didn't (quite) kill him, but it cost many hundreds of dollars to save him.

Most milk chocolate contains so little actual chocolate that a dog is unlikely to suffer any severe aftereffects from one piece; a whole box is another matter.

Dark chocolate, on the other hand, contains far more actual chocolate than milk chocolate. And even relatively small amounts of Baker's (unsweetened) chocolate can severely affect a dog. The stuff tastes bitter to you and me, but dog's think it's great. Then they die.

grapes and raisans are real bad..toxic, onions are a no no...mushrooms in the backyard can kill.... the list is pretty scary.