A record number of dogs could be killed this year by their owners feeding them chocolate, vets warned yesterday.

Many pet owners do not realise that chocolate is highly toxic to dogs.

But it contains theobromine, a naturally occurring stimulant found in the cocoa bean, which affects the central nervous system as well as the heart muscle.

Do you feed chocolate to your pet?

How many people, I wonder, do feed their pets chocolate? It could be that they don't realize how dangerous it it, for this reason I have put this article on this site.

I've always known that chocolates could kill my little guardians so I never ever feed them with chocolates.

I must admit, I was worried that some people wouldn't know. Poor little pets

I wonder, out of interest, however, how are humans able to eat loads of choccie without adverse effects - apart from weight gain that is?

we are quite complex in structure? giving us advantage?

Good job really, the amount of choccie I used to eat

I remember a few months back, I was so addicted to chocolate, I complained to my friend that I couldn't seem to resist it. Their answer was "Oh, try blah blah blah - it is organic and you can only eat a couple of squares - it is too sickly"

Great! Unfortunately, I bought a bar of this chocolate, (expensive it was too, however, if it helped me eat less, that was fine by me!). I ate one square - mmmmm lovely! Next square - how heavenly! Next, next, next..... until the whole bloody bar was gone - big thing it was too!

Nope that did not cure me

I hasten to add, I have now cut it out altogether, moderation was not possible

I have a big craving for both chocolates and coffee. and can't seem to stop. the only way of me moderating the intake was that I was at risk in having a Diabetes runs in the family.

Sometimes I will give my dog a little, however it''s never very much.

Chocolate is toxic to dogs and it should be kept away from them at all costs.

I did have a wire hair fox terrier growing up, on three occasions she got into chocolate, A LOT of it. First time was a case, not just a box, of thin mint Girl Scout cookies. She was very sick but did recover. Second time it was an entire bag of Oreo's, again, she was ill (almost four days of the runs both times), the third time she jumped up on the kitchen counter and ate an entire box of liquor filled chocolate candies AND the box itself. She was the sickest (and drunkest) after that. Dang dog still lived to be 22 years old.

She may have had a tolerance to chocolate on some level, but I'd suggest keeping all chocolate away from ALL your pets. It's also highly toxic to birds.

Here's another one if you have parrots... throw away your Teflon pans. Burning Teflon, or very hot Teflon emits a fume that is so deadly to birds it can kill them in a matter of minutes.

I'd never feed my pets chocolate, because luckily I've always known it isn't good for them.
But even if I didn't know I still wouldn't feed them chocolate, because that would leave less for me!

Chocolate contains Theobromine (an alkaloid stimulant) humans can metabolize it efficiently, dogs can't. It's true that a tiny bit of chocolate probably won't do too much, but remember it goes by the body weight of your dog.

Also bad for dogs, raisins and grapes. Ingesting large amounts of raisins/grapes often leads to kidney failure.

Basically, unless it's just a little bit of chicken or meat my dogs don't get 'people food'.

Only once, I was dumb enough to leave a square of chocolate on the table, and my 165 lb. Rottie scoffed it up before I got back to it....I knew chocolate wasn't good for dogs, but at his weight it don't affect him..I also own a cockatoo and one of the first things the breeder told me, when I bought her home, was about the teflon pans and cooking...Fortunately, I never used those type of pans, but still took precautions and would put her in her cage in her room, with the door shut, when I was cooking.....Good thread Lotus..keeps us pet owners on our toes, especially with the Holidays coming and all that good stuff in our homes..

Nope, never fed my pets chocolate...not really a chocolate eater myself, so there is never any chocolate found around my house.

i have always known that chocolate is bad for them so i have never given it to them. also i love chocolate and no offense to my dog but i think it is too good to share.

Actually, it's not as dangerous as one might think. There are alot of factors to consider, such as the size of dog, and the purity of the chocolate. I would think that people who own really small toy breed dogs should be diligent anyhow. Pure chocolate will most likely kill a dog, but that would be something like baker's chocolate - chocolate before it is diluted and sugar added for whatever chocolaty thing is being made. A chocolate cookie will hardly be something to worry about. If an average sized dog came across something like a hershey's bar, it would hardly be cause for concern. I've owned large sized dogs for years and there have been a few times where a chocolate bar has been carelessly left in a dog's reach and it never even caused the runs.

Of course it is true that chocolate is toxic to dogs. But alot of people are misled to believe that the chocolate we have as snack, or in snacks, will automatically cause serious harm to our pets if they get some. Most of the time it is not something to worry about if your dog accidently gets something chocolaty, although I think it's wise for all dog owners to know how much can harm the pet they have.

I found some info here: linky

Pet owners need to educate themselves on what their pets should and should not eat. Would never feed my dogs chocolate. My friend's brother(who's 28) left out a whole bag of chocolates on his floor this past halloween and his dog ate all of it. Made the dog sick, but it lived. He complained that his dog was stupid for eating everything wtf ...well don't leave your food lying around then. People are idiots.

On a physiological level, the complexity of a dog and a human are indistinguishable.

I don't mean intelligence, I mean cell structure and all the other stuff that makes us up.

not only is choc bad for dogs.. as was previously stated any form of grape is bad as is onion.. liver toxic..
any of these foods whether it is given in a small amount or not, does damage.. it doesnt matter if it is "just a little bit" you are still harming your dog.. as does all preserved meats (ham, bacon salami etc) ham iand pork is the worst, especially this time of year. ppl giving their animals christmas foods. the amount of dogs we had in with pancreatitis last year was amazing
human food for humans.. dog food for dogs.

My mother always told me that feeding Chocolate to dogs was bad for them.

When I was little one of our dogs jumped up onto the side in the kitchen (we were all eating in the dining room) and wolfed down my mothers homemade Christmas pudding. She couldn't cope with how rich it was and sadly died. I was about 5 at the time and made up a song that went something along the lines of 'Mummy made a Christmas pudding, Millie ate it and died.' Since then I've never been a big fan of Christmas pudding and occasionally tease my mother that her cooking killed the dog.

I've now got my own dog, my parents look after her at home while I'm at uni. Knowing that dogs can't eat chocolate I went to look around the local pet store for a dog advent calender. They have treats in the doors rather than human chocolate. I couldn't find one. However I did find one that you could give to rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs etc. I don't have any of those, and I'm not sure I'd get an advent calender for one of those if I did have one

I used to use a special chocolate flavored dog treat for training my dogs. You can get them at most pet supply stores

They're flavored with carob, and they're made from yogurt. My dogs loved them. The nice part was that they're awesome for traing because they're sort of soft and poochie gets a quick treat, that doesn't require a ton of crunching, munching and chewing to go down, which is distracting during training.

Dog Chocolate Story for everyone!!!

When I was younger I had a White Lhasa Apso named Buttons. One Christmas my mom purchased some foil (very colorful foil I might add) covered chocolate christmas tree ornamants. We had not yet put them on the tree and accidentally left them on the coffee table and ran to the store for I can't remember what.

When we came home and walked in the door there were bits of colored foil all over the floor and the bag of chocolate ornaments were nowhere to be found. Buttons comes running up to greet us with choco-mouth and foil on his face. We were all worried that the chocolate would make him sick.... it didn't. Maybe is was low grade chocolate? I think maybe the foil going through him could have done more damage than the chocolate.

All I know is for the next few days there were some colorful shiny presents around the yard in the snow.

awww. at least you know now.. learn from thy mistakes.

You could very well be right. My same crazed chocolate loving terrier also on several occasions at chocolate flavored things that never actually had any chocolate in them. The Sugar Daddies come to mind.

My sister had hidden a big bag of both regular flavor Sugar Daddies (caramel) and Chocolate flavor Sugar Daddy's in her room when she was a kid. The dog found that bag, and I'll be damned if she didn't systematically eat about 10 of the chocolate ones, never so much as touching the caramel flavored ones.

She didn't get sick at all from the Sugar Daddy's, because I don't think they have any real chocolate in them. Although the sugar isn't great for 'em.

We had a dog (Max) she got up on the counter and ate a whole chocolate cake yup chocolate frosting to. Well besides a big mess and no birthday cake for dad Max sat and sat in one spot for about 10 min. after I discovered what she did (her face and paws gave her away) we were frantic BUT then oh boy here it comes she threw up like crazy we called the vet and before I got off the phone she was ready for ice cream. She was fine but it was scary. Well taking all the attention her sister Nakemia thought it would be cool to eat a sock.

I make a point not to. But, if a few M&Ms fall on the floor I don't worry about it- they won't be hurt by a M&M or two.

Also, Lysol sprayed anywhere near a bird can be lethal. I am careful with any type of spray near my birdie. After all, they used to use canaries to check for toxic fumes in coal mines, because they are more sensitive to toxins. I knew someone once who had a relative that allowed his lovebird to fly around the kitchen while he was cooking, until the poor thing accidentally landed in a pan of oil, and lost one of his legs. This depressed the bird, and he chewed on his other leg until it had to be removed. Then this guy let his nephew hold the bird, and the kid took it outside, where the bird flew off, and was never found. He had an ad in the paper that read, "Lost, Lovebird...no legs." I heard the rest of the story when I took the ad to work and showed it to everyone, and we all laughed. One of my co-workers said, "That is my great grandson's bird" Oops, sorry for laughing at the ad, but how the heck could that bird land anywhere outside without falling over, and if it has fallen over, how can it possibly take off in flight?

oh birds could definitely fly without legs, no problem.

In fact, it's worth mentioning that even if you clip their wings (contrary to popular belief, this doesn't hurt them at all) they can STILL fly away. All they need to do is hold those wings out, catch the right kind of breeze, and they're off.

But yes, allowing birds to free-fly around the house is generally a very bad idea. That's not the first feathered friend I"ve heard of landing in a pan of hot oil. There are so many dangers. Ceiling fans, fireplaces, open windows, closed windows, too many to mention really.

2 dog+chocolate=mayhem stories;

1. Every year, our relatives send my mom these really expensive chocolates that we can't get here. Anyways, they wrap them, and usually you can tell when it's a box of chocolates, so we don't put those under the tree, because we have a shihtzu than likes to open presents as it is, wrapped food isn't a great idea. Anyways, one year they sent them in a weird shaped box, and we didn't know they were chocolates. Long story short, we came home, and there were box shreddings everywhere, and no chocolate. The same thing happened one year when the dog got into a bag of chocolate my mom bought at easter. She's never gotten sick, which is kind of strange because she's pretty small.

2. Back in elementary school we had to sell chocolates (the combinations of chocolate caramels, chocolate almonds and chocolate bars) door to door. A friend of mine had two sisters, so they had 3 of the cases of chocolates that they had to sell. Anyways, they got to take a week off of school to go with their parents on a business trip, and they hired a dog sitter who didnt know about the chocolates. When they got back, there were no more chocolates, and the dog was sick (she's fine now) but they had to pay for vet bills, and $75 per case of chocolate.

I have fed my dog chocolate for about 7 years now and she's fine. She'll be turning 15 this coming year.

I have always known chocolate kills. 10gm can put a jack russell in a coma.

You can get chocolate made for dogs thats what we used to get for my dog and if we were desperate for a chocolate fix we would eat it too.

Now i have heard white chocolate is safe but i highly doubt it

Give your dog the ham bone or turkey bones for xmas

I feed my dogs chocolate at least 3 times a week in small doses. My first dog lived to be 17 years old, eating chocolate all his life and died just this year. His cause of death was cancer, not chocolate.

In order for a dog to die on chocolate you have to give it a lot of it. I believe in small doses chocolate is safe for your dog. Most dogs don't live to be 17 years old. I can only wonder if chocolate made him live longer. I have 2 new dogs now, they are on the chocolate diet and they will stay that way.

We had a pet dog when I was younger we fed it anything from chocolate to vindaloo... He lived to a ripe old age of 19.