Dog eating unripe cherries

[foolonthehill]

Here again for some advice: in our small back garden we have a cherry tree...we seldom get cherries...the birds eat the ones on the tree and there are loads that fall before they are ripe. This is the problem...foolishdog has decided that they are food and will not pass them by. She eats them pit and all......

just read that the pits are poisonous...are they???

Don't know about cherry pits, but any pits/stones in the stomach/guts can't be good, as I would imagine they could build up and cause a blockage.

We have a similar problem with the greengage tree in our garden, so we bought a roll of netting and some stakes and just net off the tree until it's finished fruiting.

Our oldgirl used to actually climb the tree and pull the greengages off if we didn't get the net up in time.

!!! wow that is dedication.
Our garden is the size of the cherry tree canopy but maybe if I net off some of it and sweep the rest I can reduce the impact.

For the first time ever i am willing the blooming birds to get busy and eat the cherries!!!

Before we started netting a big circle around the tree, we used to go out first thing every morning and regularly through the day to pick up as many as we could and pick any that looked fresh enough straight off the tree.

Then we'd have to go out every time the dog did to supervise. She was absolutely obsessed with them and would do anything to get to the tree - wily old thing that she was.

Our neighbour has a lovely cherry tree - there's a slight overhang into our garden and she did warn us to make sure our spaniel doesn't eat any! Seems they can ferment in the stomach...

We have four cherry trees that fruit quite heavily and our dog likes especially to eat the stones. He is also partial to unripe peaches. His favourite fruit is raspberries which he sort of inhales off the canes. None of this seems to cause him any particular trouble, although he is quite young so I suppose there could be trouble ahead.

Oldgirl used to pick and scoff all the best blackberries and raspberries as well - much to the chagrin on my dcs.