Vet Times

Don’t feed your dog bones

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bones
Don’t feed your dog bones. Image ©iStock.com/mashabuba

Time for a controversial one, I feel… I have three dogs, and other than those they manage to scavenge in the park, I won’t let them have bones!

For those of you preparing to type away and tell me how wrong I am to advocate such a thing, this tip is based on one of the hardest cases I’ve dealt with in my 25 years as a vet, which involved a lamb bone lodged in the distal oesophagus.

This incident was several years ago and, thankfully, our friend is now doing fine, but it was incredibly traumatic for all concerned at the time.

As I type this I am waiting to see a dog that is straining to pass fragments of bone and is in a lot of discomfort.

So, go on – tell me how wrong I am, and give me all the evidence-based medicine that you should…

Comments

4 responses to “Don’t feed your dog bones”

  1. Jane Davidson Avatar
    Jane Davidson

    Totally agree! I’ve found most clients can’t tell the difference between cooked and uncooked bones so it’s too risky to give out as advice.

    Reply
  2. Kerry Buchanan Avatar
    Kerry Buchanan

    Agreed. I’m a retired vet who saw too many like the case you describe. I’m also the owner of a mongrel who loves raiding wheelie bins. 24 hours in the vets and a lot of discomfort didn’t seem to teach her not to eat lamb and chicken bones!

    Reply
  3. geoff Avatar
    geoff

    I have been feeding my dogs and cats raw bones for nearly 20 years, and started advising my clients to do so, along with a totally raw diet. It was the best thing I ever did, and I finished up with 4 chest freezers at the back of the practice to keep up with the demand. About 30% of dogs with a chronic problem – guts, skins, AGs, teeth etc simply got better and required no other ‘treatment’. In this time I had one 14 y/o setter who ate too many bones without meat and required an enema. A small price to pay for 100s of dogs with continual anal gland problems, dogs and cats requiring regular dental treatment. Consider the number of cats who develop kidney failure after dentals. Just think for one moment about the human advice for a healthy diet – variety, unprocessed, ‘5-a-day’ raw veg, as natural as possible – and realise the appalling thing we do as a profession advising the totally processed, unnatural, never changing ‘veterinary recommended scientific’ pot noodle we were told was a good idea at college by the companies who make them.

    Reply
  4. emmagoodmanmilne Avatar
    emmagoodmanmilne

    I’ve seen irrefutable unnecessary suffering as a result of raw food diets and would never recommend them. Good quality balanced nutrition is one of the biggest factors in increased longevity in my opinion. I always recommend for my clients what I believe to be gold standard advice and what I would do and do do for my own animals. This does happen to be the ‘processed’ food we were taught about at uni but I also recommend a lot of other things I was taught about at uni so I feel very comfortable with that.

    Reply

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