Over the next few days kitchens will be full of people chopping, cutting, mashing and baking ahead of the Christmas dinner. With all this food prep one animal will be omnipresent, looking for any fallen crumb and begging for a little taste - your dog!
But a lot of what we eat is bad for man's best friend, as Dr Bobby Ortiz explains. Dr Bobby is the Head of the Exotics Service at Veterinary Specialists Ireland and Ireland's only Advanced Practitioner in Zoological Medicine - you can see him on your screens on RTÉ's The Big Pet Project.
But first, in case you feel guilty for saying no - don't! Puppy dog eyes are real, as the vet explains: "Dogs have evolved to have specific facial muscles that allow them to raise their eyebrows and appear more 'child-like' which helped humans become more attached and endeared to them. It has also allowed them to be emote and communicate even more with subtle facial movements."
So, let's find out what dog owners need to avoid feeding their four-legged friends this festive season - no matter how much they beg! And if your pet is having any issues contact your local vet straight away.
Meat and more for a treat
At this time of year a lot of people will say, 'I'm going to make my dog a big Christmas meal too.' The big mistake is that you give your pets what us humans are eating with seasoning, extra salt and oil and all that stuff - that is not good.
So, whatever is made for them needs to be low fat and you don't need any seasoning, no salt, anything like that. All your typical meat is absolutely safe, and I recommend all of it to be cooked. Turkey, fish, lamb, red meat like steak, chicken, all those things are fine. At home even I'll make a steak, but I will boil it.
I don't fry it, because again, that extra fat is not good for them. And what we see around this time of year in the veterinary field is that we see a huge number of pancreatitis cases in dogs. It can be life-threatening.
The pancreas is responsible for producing acid, and when we have big fatty meals, our pancreas kicks into gear. In dogs, it can lead to secretions of that acid into the abdominal cavity and causes severe pain and it can be very serious.
Animals have died from severe pancreatitis. And when they get it once, they're predisposed to getting it again. That can sometimes be solely driven by high fatty foods.
So again, say no to having a big fatty steak or an oily steak or any oily food. But if you do want to make them a Christmas dinner, mashed potatoes are fine, peas, different types of green beans, all that kind of stuff is very safe for animals. So, those are things that we can give our dogs.
But again, I generally recommend that it's not the same food that we're eating on the table. Also, I would say I really am not a fan of raw food diet, but that can be quite controversial. But I'm not, and I think most veterinarians are not in favour of raw food diets.
No bones about it
I'm not in favour of giving a cooked bone. In fact, I'm not in favour of bones, period.
Again, in the veterinary profession, the number of cases that we see of foreign ingestion that we must go and do surgery to remove them, or they get them lodged into their throat and we lose patients because they can't breathe or they get severely constipated.
Then we must go in and perform enemas to remove these bones. Again, I'd say no to bones and definitely no cooked bones. Cooked bones can splinter when they're fully cooked, the pets chew them, and they can fracture off and can be really, really sharp. Uncooked bones are more pliable and can be digested better, but again, I've seen so many problems with both.
I'm not a fan of like pig's ears and all that kind of stuff either, all the things that you see around this time of year. We just see too many cases of animals that have these chewy toys that they're not used to getting. They get wedged in the back of their throat, and they're choking and all these kinds of different hazards there.
A recipe for disaster
There are obvious ones we know like chocolates that need to be avoided, but Christmas pudding, mince pies and these types of these desserts are bad too.
A lot of times people make mince pies - they are full of bad ingredients for dogs. Grapes are bad, but if you think of grapes, then think of what's even more concentrated than a grape is a raisin. That makes them more potent in a negative way.
Sultanas are also very, very toxic to dogs, even more so than grapes. So again, Christmas puddings and mince pies are a concern.
I'd also mention anything in the onion family. So, if you think of shallots, chives and things like garlic can actually cause them to have haemolytic disorders. So that's very dangerous.
People love cooking, just like I do, with onions and garlic and foodstuffs, and they are toxic to our pets. And when you are chopping things up and the dog is on alert to anything falling from the countertop, it's something to keep an eye on.
I hope this is an obvious one, but alcohol is not good. Obviously, it has the same effect as it does on, but they're not used to it at all. And then you have other kinds of other sweets and nuts is another one as well. Like macadamia nuts are quite dangerous and not good for dogs.
Keep your dog away from sweets
And now. it's time to talk about sweets in general. One of the things around this time of year is we have lots of sweets, candy and foodstuffs like that that are often out and accessible to everyone - including your pets.
And a lot of these contain a sweetener called Xylitol, and this substance is incredibly toxic to dogs. It's kind of similar to grapes to raisins as the full dosage can be concentrated.
While we are not entirely sure of the exact amount (or dose) that can lead to severe toxicity in dogs, even a small amount is enough to be lethal. I have unfortunately seen giant breed dogs eat only a few jellybeans which lead to serious illness, while some dogs have even died from eating two or three sweets.
But then, another dog eats a lot and does not have any issues - but don't risk it. These cases tend to have something in common, in terms of the use of Xylitol in a lot of the products. So, to say again that is very, very toxic. We need to be very careful with, and avoid giving or even dropping, these kinds of sweets around our pets.
Festive felines
I know that we are focusing on dogs, but it' worth mentioning cats too. As vets, we see a huge number of problems with cats around Christmas when it comes to Christmas trees with tinsel and ribbon.
Cats can ingest the same bad foods as dogs, but we see a lot of what's called linear foreign bodies at this time of year.
It’s in their nature to like chasing bits of strings and people buy toys to play with them. They'll often have a string on them, and so a cat that will see lots if similar thing up on the Christmas tree.
They then eat string or swallow tinsel and that can cause really, really severe obstructions in their stomach where they get this linear foreign body. It affects a huge portion of their intestines. So that's something we see a lot around this time of year in cats.
Dr Bobby Ortiz, BA, BSc, MVB, GPCert/PgC (ExAP), MRCVS, is the Head of the Exotics Service at Veterinary Specialists Ireland and Ireland's only Advanced Practitioner in Zoological Medicine. With 15 years in the veterinary world, Bobby brings expertise and down-to-earth enthusiasm to his work.
On The Big Pet Project, Dr Bobby is there to tell us more about some of his unusual patients. It's the show with everything from surfing dogs and painting ponies to goal-scoring turtles, as hosts Demi Isaac and Adam Beales hit the road to meet your weird, wacky and talented pets - it's pure chaos and cuteness!
