Thanksgiving Foods That Are Dangerous for Dogs
Keep your dog safe at dinner by learning which holiday foods to avoid and where to put scraps instead.
Many Thanksgiving foods can make dogs very sick, including fatty turkey and skin, cooked bones, onions, grapes, chocolate, xylitol sweets, raw dough, and alcohol. Keep dogs away from plates, serving dishes, scraps, and open trash during the meal. Pancreatitis is a painful inflammation of the pancreas often triggered by rich, fatty foods.
For dogs, even holiday table scraps can carry enough fat, seasoning, or toxins to need veterinary care.
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Why turkey, skin, and bones are risky
The American Veterinary Medical Association warns through Thanksgiving pet safety guidance that turkey or turkey skin can trigger life-threatening pancreatitis in dogs and cats. Fatty foods are hard for pets to digest, so even a small amount matters. Cooked poultry bones add another danger.
They can splinter, cause choking, injure the digestive tract, or block the intestines. Keep turkey carcasses and bones off tables and counters, and out of open trash.
Which savory sides hide onion and grape dangers?
The ASPCA Animal Poison Control explains in people foods to avoid for pets that onions, garlic, leeks, chives, and onion or garlic powder damage dogs' red blood cells. That damage can cause anemia. These ingredients hide in stuffing, gravy, casseroles, and roasted vegetables.
The same ASPCA guidance warns that grapes, raisins, and currants can cause acute kidney failure in dogs. No safe amount has been established, and the exact toxic substance remains unknown. Keep fruit salads, stuffings, desserts, and cheese boards with these fruits away from dogs.
Which desserts and drinks should stay out of reach?
Chocolate contains theobromine and caffeine. Cornell University Veterinary Specialists notes in Thanksgiving safety advice that baking and dark chocolate are especially concerning, with signs that can include vomiting, rapid heart rate, tremors, and seizures. Sugar-free gum, candy, and baked goods can contain xylitol, also labeled birch sugar or wood sugar.
The Food and Drug Administration warns in paws off xylitol guidance that xylitol can cause rapid low blood sugar, liver injury, and death in dogs. Alcoholic drinks, eggnog, and foods made with alcohol can cause vomiting, breathing difficulty, tremors, coma, and death. Macadamia nuts can cause weakness, vomiting, and tremors in dogs.
How can you protect dogs during dinner?
Raw yeast dough rises in a dog's warm stomach and causes painful gas and dangerous bloating. Fermenting yeast also produces alcohol that enters the bloodstream quickly. Keep rising dough covered, high up, and behind a closed oven or pantry door.
Store leftovers promptly and keep trash behind a closed door until it goes outside.
- Clear plates directly into a closed trash can
- Move the turkey carcass into a sealed container right after carving
- Ask guests not to share scraps or drinks
- Give the dog its regular meal and water in another room