“Don’t freak if your dog licks up a little glue,” says Dr. A wad of fabric will get stuck in the stomach, but a string of the fabric unraveling at the edge will make its way down into the intestine and can also cause slicing into the intestinal wall. “The string can then literally saw through the intestine and cause a perforation.” Because one end of the string is anchored in place, the intestine can’t pass the string, so the “intestine crawls up the string instead” to try to digest it, Dr. The reason it’s so bad is that one end of the piece of string often gets stuck under the tongue or inside the stomach, and the rest of the string passes into the intestine. “But the rules for species are not hard and fast,” he says. Cats like to play with string-like objects and will swallow cassette tape, ribbon, yarn, and the like whereas dogs tend to go for big pieces of fabric or toys. “Strings tend to be more of a cat problem,” Dr. Called linear foreign bodies by veterinarians, these include string that was used to wrap meat and was then discarded. Smaller ones, like little rocks, often pass out of the stomach and then get stuck in the small intestine.
Larger items, like a wad of fabric, tend to remain in the stomach. These include everything from the aforementioned corn cob segments to the nipples on baby bottles, the pits of stone fruits, and plastic items such as little squeaky toys. “Don’t allow access to the garbage can,” he advises.ĭiscrete objects. “It’s one of the biggies” in terms of what dogs swallow, and like cloth material, it can cause GI obstructions. “Dogs will fish this out of the trash,” Dr. In other words, use a hamper with a secure lid, or keep undone laundry locked away. “Owners of new puppies in particular should be very careful about leaving that stuff around the house until they know their dog doesn’t have the inclination to try to swallow everything he comes into contact with,” Dr. Some of those dogs then get carried away and swallow such undergarments whole, gulping them down and causing obstructions either in their stomach or intestines. Dogs like the odor of their owners, so it’s no surprise that some end up mouthing dirty laundry that has people’s scent on it - socks, underwear, pantyhose, and the like. Items Dangerous for Dogs to SwallowĬloth items. We’ve seen dogs go back to surgery multiple times for foreign object removal.”įollowing, a list of objects that are dangerous to swallow, very dangerous, and - contrary to popular opinion - safe. Don’t think a dog will learn from his experience and not do it again.
“We do occasionally see older dogs swallow foreign objects, too,” Dr. They like playing with things, are curious about the world, and investigate with their mouths. “Be most alert to this possibility early in a dog’s life. “Those dogs most inclined to swallow things are young,” notes Dr. It’s after someone has cut it into segments. We had to perform an operation to take them out. “I had one dog whose owners had decorative pea gravel rocks around their pool. “Dogs will literally swallow almost anything,” says Cummings School surgeon John Berg, DVM.
It’s just some of the items swallowed by dogs and then retrieved from their GI tracts by Tufts veterinarians - on a regular basis! No, it’s not leftover refuse found in a pile at the town dump. Pantyhose, golf balls, socks, rocks, underwear, baby bottle nipples, peach pits, plastic gadgets, wood glue, magnets.
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