With pets in the house, the possibilities for Christmas celebrations and decorations are often limited. For instance, are poinsettias integral to your favorite Christmas memories as a child? If you have and cat and/or dog, you had best reminisce about Christmas flowers at work or with photographs. Poinsettias are poisonous to both major pet types. This isn’t the only way pets can put a whole new spin on Christmas. Good thing they’re so lovable, since cats and dogs can rain all kinds of terror, including pee-sprinkled packages, on your holiday plans. Instead of a Christmas shaped like a holiday stocking or Bethlehem star, it’s like having a cat or dog-molded Christmas.
Christmas pet poisons
Poinsettias aren’t the only plants that can poison your pets. If your cat takes a bite or two out of a lily, the result can be severe acute kidney failure. Poor cat! And talk about taking the merry out of Christmas. The spiny leaves in Christmas and English holly can cause severe gastrointestinal misery upon pets, since they contain toxic substances, such as cyanogens and saponins. Alas, even mistletoe can irritate the stomachs of dogs and cats, causing them to collapse, have seizures, and walk drunk. This isn’t the kind of company you want to walk drunk with when you drink spiked egg nog. To make sure your Christmas celebration is detoxified and safe for animals, avoid all of these seasonal favorites.
Tactics for all-out pet proofing
There’s almost no way to get around hard-core pet-proofing, to ensure that no lives at your home are lost throughout the alleged jolly season. The following are a few more warnings for being a responsible pet owner at Christmas:
- Maintain your tree with this in mind: Pets can choke on Christmas tree needles, tinsel, and the ribbons on packages. They also love to urinate on Christmas packages.
- Keep a fresh supply of water on hand for dogs and cats. If they venture to drink from the Christmas tree stand, it could contain bacteria that causes messy diarrhea, though the water is not considered to be poisonous.
- Two things that should be abundant in every household at Christmas are chocolate and alcohol. But both can cause pets to develop food poisoning.
- If your pets become overzealous during the excitement of Christmas morning and accidentally swallow a battery inside of a toy or musical greeting card, it could quickly cause internal burns.
Plus – no presents?
One of the fun things you can thrill in is the indescribable joy on a child’s or an elder’s face when you give them an adorable rescue animal, puppy or kitten for Christmas! But don’t do it! According to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), gifting an animal at Christmas is the equivalent of killing an elephant for the tusks or some such.
You may be like countless pet lovers and find that there is possibly no way to maintain control of your own Christmas celebration when you have a pet. This is a case of making a proverbial bed and having to lie in it with dog and cat hair all throughout the holidays.
