Rope toys continue to kill dogs
A “foreign body” is the term we use to describe anything other than food that your pet may have swallowed. It can be very complicated to determine whether a particular foreign body will make your pet sick. The most difficult cases of foreign body ingestion occur whenever the pet owner doesn’t know that their pet swallowed something.
Also, many foreign bodies that pets swallow are not dense enough to show up on an X-ray. However, the statistics about pets swallowing foreign objects may shock you. About 95 percent of all foreign objects swallowed by pets will pass without causing any problems. However, the other 5 percent of foreign objects are usually very serious and cause life threatening illness.
There have been countless times when I was amazed at the kind of foreign bodies in the colon captured on X-rays during examination for some other problem. These cases were not affected by the foreign body, they were just coincidental findings that were swallowed and passed without incident. I have seen things like nails, staples, wire, rocks, rubber balls, and even sewing needles.
Obviously, some toys are more dangerous than others as well as some pets are more destructive and likely to swallow a piece of a chew toy. Therefore, pet owners should pay close attention to their pet and decide on an individual basis which toys are right for their pet. Small balls about the size of a golf ball or smaller are never a good idea simply because they are easily swallowed yet too big to pass from the stomach into the intestines.
Many owners ask whether or not raw hide chews are safe. For many dogs raw hide chews seem to be fine, however if a dog bites off a large piece and swallows it, the dog may vomit for a day or two until the rawhide dissolves.
However, there is one type of foreign body that is much worse than most everything your pet could possibly swallow. We refer to it as a linear foreign body. A linear foreign body is one that extends from the stomach down into the intestines. The most common linear foreign bodies include sewing thread, yarn, any kind of string, and most commonly rope toys.
You should never let your pet play with a rope toy! Rope toys encourage pet owners to play tug-of-war with their pet which is not good behavior. Most importantly, if they swallow a portion of the rope, the results are often extremely devastating. Often, part of the rope will pass into the intestines while a portion of it gets stuck in the stomach. The stomach and intestines continues to try to push the rope through thereby causing the rope to mimic a draw-string similar to a pair of sweat pants.
Therefore, a large amount of intestines is drawn into a very tight ball. As you can imagine, this is extremely painful and can cause permanent damage to the intestines. Commonly, the string or rope actually begins to cut into the intestines causing lacerations which are difficult to repair.
Recently, I was presented with a young Schnauzer puppy named Lexi that had stopped eating, began vomiting, and was having pains in her abdomen. Her owners were not aware of anything she might have swallowed. X-rays did not reveal an obvious foreign body.
However, we performed a test known as a barium series. It is performed by giving the patient liquid barium which shows up on X-rays very well. In Lexi’s case, the barium did not move out of the stomach into the intestines showing us that she had an obstruction.
We performed surgery on Lexi to remove a linear foreign body by cutting open her stomach and three places in her intestines. This was an extremely serious surgery that lasted for two and a half hours.
Fortunately, Lexi recovered very well from surgery and is at home being a normal puppy once again.
Unfortunately, many pets that swallow portions of rope toys never survive long enough to have surgery or too much permanent damage occurs.
Sometimes it is impossible to stop pets from chewing and swallowing certain objects. You should be careful with what type of toys you give them to play with. Be especially mindful of the toys they are allowed to have when you cannot supervise them. If you have a question or if you think your pet may have swallowed a foreign object, contact your veterinarian as soon as possible to ensure that your pet lives a long, healthy and happy life.
Hi there. I’m Grace. I am a very hard working, compassionate and strong willed woman who loves a challenge and never backs down from a hard days work, which is a good mix for working with dogs that are having trouble getting along in the world with us humans! The greatest reward I get in life is when someone tells me I saved the life of their dog so they didn’t have to give it up! I love nothing more then showing people how to be a leader in their own world and all aspects of life! I am a leader, and walk my own path in life and I’ll go where ever it takes me!
Why are stores selling rope toys if they are killing animals? I am very mad
Its all about profit vs safety
If I cut off the strings on the ends of my dogs rope… do you think that would be okay? Or would short strings do just as much damage? Thanks in advance!
Throw it away, its dangerous for choking or getting caught in digestive track or bowels! Buy a new toy!$20 is cheaper for a toy then possible hundreds at a vet.
My dogs name is Doc, I sometimes call him Doc Holiday from the movie Tombstones. Anyway I recently got home about 2-3 weeks ago because his original owners had an extremely bad vehicle accident. He’s about 2 years old and he’s a mixed breed, I think it’s a mix of a Black and Tan with black mouth cur. He’s kind of a large dog and needs to have something to chew on besides my arm.. LOL????. So I made him a toy out of all natural cotton rope and he loves it. But even though it’s made of natural fibers, I’m still worried it might be bad for him to swallow. This wasn’t no sloppy made toy either, I make horse halters, dog collars, dog leashes, and pretty anything you ask me to do I can make. Anyway, I’m curious as if the cotton fibers would still mess up his stomach. He needs something to play with, without me worrying whether or not it’ll be fatal if he swallows some of it. Any suggestions?? (I prefer not to have to go buy some $15 chew toy that’ll be devoured within 2 days) oh and I’ve looked on YouTube and the material they suggested wasn’t even remotely better than what I already have.
I have a wool carpet that it sheds once in a while and she goes around eating that fluff. I can’t manage to vacuum everyday, so I have a dachshund who loves vacuuming the fluff for me. I am worried this can hurt her, so every time I see her I try to stop her. Not sure what I can do at this point since it is an expensive carpet. Also I have this toy duck that she loves and it has small (feather like fluff) around its body that mimics a baby ducks hair and she plucks them out (instincts I believe), but they are so tiny, so I don’t worry too much, but try to stop her when I see her plucking. But this article and all of your comments made me think twice of what I am giving my dog. Michael did you find the answer to your question?
You can try spraying vinegar on the rug to deter her, never give her toys that mimic something she can’t have ie. no toy or old shoes if you don’t want her to ruin new shoes!
This just happened to us. Almost exactly! I had no idea these rope toys were so dangerous!!
After almost 10 years of playing with them with no problem , my golden Ret. Ate one.
Vet figured out in time to do surgery what the issue was as we didn’t see him eat it. 1 st surgery 3 different incisions to get the strings out of intestines, complications, surgery #2 then down hill from there. We had no more choices… then all of a sudden he responded to the Iv meds and transfusion. Fluid stopped leaking into his stomach.
Today we had our check up and finally are on the mend. Still on antibiotics, but feeling good.
The last 3 weeks have been hell, and totally preventable.
I am telling everyone I know who has pets to get rid of the rope toys.
I am so sorry that you had such a bad experience, this is exactly why I do what I do and post things that I feel are important to all dog lovers. I live every day trying to bring animal safety awareness to everyone who reads this website. please pass on this info so we can prevent another dog from having to go through this. Again sorry for your dog, I am very happy to hear that it all worked out in the end. Good luck moving forward.
Hi Grace
Can you give us some advice about what kind of toys ARE safe for dogs who like to chew? My 2 yr old Australian Shepherd is lovely in every way, but she does like to chew on/pull apart things. She is very good about only chewing toys we give her. Everyone advises using toys to keep dogs entertained/busy and out of trouble, but it seems every time I turn around there is another warning about rope toys, rawhide, bones, stuffed toys (a no no in our house anyway), etc. What CAN she play with safely when we are out during the day? Digestible things like sweet potato chews, etc. last about 1 minute; bully sticks, about 5 minutes. We need something she can really work on for a while.
Thanks
After much research the toys I recommend for big chewers are the Chuck it balls, they look like a tennis ball but no fluff they are orange with a blue stripe, also the toys made from fire hoses are good, Kong is another good brand to choose from lots of variety, also a real bone from the butcher is good, not the ones from the pet stores as they are very high in salt but traight from the butcher is great, they call them soup bones. Hope this helps you a bit, if you have any more questions please feel free to ask, better safe then sorry.
I thought soup bones splinter and the dog can swallow them or get it stuck in their throat. I wouldn’t leave them unsupervised with a soup bone