We were catching up on a bit of shut-eye and never heard the phone ring. When we got up 2 hours later we found a text message from Jemima, who had been web-cam watching, saying:
Think someone is eating something they shouldn’t on the webcam… Looks like little capsules, red and blue.
Sure enough when we looked on the floor there were bits of chewed-up cardboard and a few capsules with teeth marks in them! That’ll be Fin, I announced confidently.
Jemima said:
No, it wasn’t Fin, he was tucked up in bed. It was a naughty black and tan.
Skully!!!
We rang and spoke to the vet. We agreed that any or all the dogs could have participated in the pill party, but a few anti-biotics were unlikely to be life-threatening.
Worst case scenario could be a bit of diarrhoea – but we can deal with that.
Also if they had eaten a lot of tablets it could affect their kidneys.
We decided on a treatment for all the dogs.
Charcoal to absorb any undigested tablets, and lots to drink, – water with a dash of milk to make it tasty.
I also have a herbal kidney enhancer so I put a dose in the drink. “It wouldn’t hurt” said our vet.
So we’ve covered all the bases and are not expecting any problems.
More than likely they got a taste of the capsules and thought “Yuk” and went back to eating the packet!
How did they get them? They were on a shelf out of reach – so we thought.
Next time they go in a drawer!
… Anne
This is deja vue for me too.
Some years ago when we were heavily involved in puppy rescue, we bought a large drum of approx 50 worming tablets from our vet so we could worm each pup as they came into rescue.
They were left at the back of the work surface in the kitchen where the dogs couldn’t reach them -- so we thought.
We went out on a rescue, leaving our dogs in the kitchen. When we got home the container was on the floor -- open!
We put the pups in a pen we had prepared earlier, with food and water, bundled our dogs into the car and headed out to the vets.
They were given a substance to make them vomit, and we had instructions not to worm them for a while!!!
… Anne
Glad they all ok I had a right panic seeing the tablets on the floor. I had a similar situation when looking after my old bosses dog a labrador, and 4 standard wire haired daschunds. They had gone on their hols at lunch time, and shortly afterwards, I arrived to see the dogs, and on the kitchen floor were 2 crunched up tablet bottles and packet of capsules!
Now as with your case Anne, if ones had it they all have, so off to the vets we went all squashed into my car along with my lot so thats 9 dogs at that time in the car!!
The labrador was on heart treatment so these were the tablets they had eaten, honestly! All were fine they all had ECGs and were monitored and came to no harm apart from bringing up bits of tablet bottles!
And as with you Anne these tablets are now kept in a drawer and not on the side.
Oh and did I mention their owner is a vet !!! Would have thought they would have known better especially after the same labrador in question ate a bar of 80% coco cooking chocolate, but thats another story!