Iam here again to talk about toys. Unfortunately the occasion is not so playful. Unfortunately it is in fact of the nth operation to remove a stone from a dog’s intestine.
Dogs, as I wrote many times, are social animals and therefore they love playing to reinforce the links with the herd even using objects/toys to do mimic innate behaviors. The most evident one is the so called game of “predation”.
Our dog takes in his mouth the toy and starts to shake it violently with movements of his head and with a mimic of the killing of the prey. Another predatory game is the “pull and spring” that foresee the involvement of other dogs or even human “actors”. This game mimics the killing of the prey and the sharing with the herd that occurs by polling with violence from a side to the other. A woven of strong stuff in a long or round shape will meet the aim and be a perfect prey!
An exclusive game of female s is the “offspring”. To mimic the care of the puppy, they use stuffed animals or even very strange objects (it occurred to see even a rubber pipe..) by taking them in bed and by defending them form possible dangers, by licking them with love and sometimes also making yelps and laments.
This particular behavior can be noticed during the phases of the “hysterical pregnancy”, about 2 months after the appearing of heat for hormonal effect and disappears after the sterilization.
The “bringing back” is another game loved by many dogs. Unfortunately many owners think that launch a stone is a harmless gesture because “they don’t eat so far..” And instead it sometimes happens!
The probabilities that this case can damage the dog are not frequent, but they can occur.
In fact, if the stone is small, it will exit by itself, through the normal ways, without consequences. But a stone with bigger sizes could also cause vomit or, much more serious case, an intestinal block (like a real knot due to the torsion of colon) and consequent Necrosis of the involved intestinal part.
In this case an operation is obligatory to remove the interested intestinal tract with all the post operation consequences. For these games, the advice are to use always a small ball paying attention of its correct sizes for the mouth of the subject: not too small because it could be ingested an cause same consequences as the ones of the ingestion of a stone, not to big otherwise it couldn’t be grabbed.
For the other games let’s observe however some important tricks. Stuff animals or woven, have to be in a non-toxic material, without any application and they mustn’t fray, to avoid that pad or small decoration pieces like eyes or buttons are ingested. The small rattles that can be foudn in may toys should be avoided in any case: besides causing a big bother to their delicate ear there is till the danger that they can be ingested.
Also avoid games made of material easily destructible, that frays in small pieces, like certain plastics, that have to be however non-toxic.
Among the many toys for dogs or cats that are on sale, skill toys or stimulating intelligence and coordination, “Orma” of BamaPet is a valid solution both for the game of “predation”, because it is easily apprehensible with teeth, and the “ pull and spring” because thanks to its shape it can be grasped both by the owner and another dog.
Its manageability allows to launch it easily to dogs who love the game of “ bringing back” and it can be chose in two versions, small and big, according to the dog’s sizes.