companions: turkeytime tips

Companions

thanksgiving tips for pets

by alexis grogan

The holidays are upon us once again, and with this food and fun filled time can leave us frazzled, heck you cane barely negotiate a filled grocery store let alone a labels on everything in the store. As we all know overindulging in copious amounts of food can be unhealthy for us all, but it is also unhealthy and dangerous for our pets. Be sure to keep your feast on the table, preferably on your plate, rather than under it, the foods that we eat on a daily basis are actually poisonous to our pets.

Eating turkey skin, even a small amount, can cause a life-t threatening condition in pets known as pancreatitis. Animals cannot digest fatty foods and most food that we eat are poisonous to animals things like onions, raisins and grapes. If you want to include your pet in a thanksgiving feast buy a treat that is specifically for them, the one thing that we all find tempting (yes even your pets) is chocolate. Chocolate is incredibly dangerous to animals, specially dogs, the artificial sweetener called xylitol, most commonly seen in gum and sugar free baked goods, is deadly to dogs.

Let me tell you a funny story before I continue, one year on thanksgiving we had gotten a new dog a few months prior, he was about three months old on thanksgiving he is a Bichon Frise so he's not very big. All of our family members were in the dining room enjoying dinner, the next thing we see is my little fluffy puppy with a turkey leg double his size in his mouth. First we are laughing as he prances around the table very proud of his prize, then we proceeded to retrieve it from him, with success. Unfortunately, the family member that wanted that turkey leg did not get to enjoy it. He and the dog exchanged some woofs and growls and went about their business.

Another thing to do is keep your trash can out of sight and smell of your pets, turkey bones can be very harmful to pets, they are very sharp and can cut through their esophagus which causes them not to breathe and internal bleeding, if you feel like your pet has gotten into any food they should not have, you can actually treat it at home, if you have hydrogen peroxide put a teaspoon amount into water for your pet and make sure they drink it, this combination will make the vomit up anything they may have ingested. Please keep your pets safe this holiday season and I wish you a happy, safe and healthy thanksgiving.

Alexis Grogan is the owner of City Pet Sitting Services, Contact her at AGrogan0892@icloud.com; 540-735-8228; or on facebook