Dog ate onions

[MaryLennoxsScowl]

DH just came home with DDog and says dog had found a bag full of noodles, vegetables and whole onions (like a bin bag with some old veg and cooked food chucked in) and had been happily wolfing it down for a while before he noticed. Problem is we have no idea what he’d managed to eat. Dog seems absolutely fine, no sign of distress when stomach poked, gums look normal. It was about half an hour ago. Should I be worried?

I imagine doggo might be a bit windy later on perhaps. Best keep the windows open.

The internet helpfully (as it always does) says onions are poison and you should go to vet. Vet is closed; I don’t know whether the dog even ate the onions; there’s a foot of snow!

Call your vet. They might be able to give dog something to make it vomit it all up.

My dog ate a tiny bit of something she shouldn’t, and ended up staying at the vet for 48hrs on drips and things to support her kidneys. She’s an XS dog though.

I think it’s one of those things that depends on the dog, their size and how much they ate.

Do you know if the onions were raw? Honestly can't see any dog eating raw onions!

I'd still call emergency vet. Problem with onions/grapes/chocolate in dogs is that by the time they show symptoms they're often already in kidney failure and its too late.

It's like putting the wrong fuel in your car and saying you'll go to the garage if it breaks down, it's too late then, the damage is done.

Your vet should have an out of hours service. Phone them and ask for advice. Onions are indeed highly toxic. Your dog may or may not have eaten them. Do you want to risk it for the sake of a phone call.

Tell DH to watch the dog better. Grabbing a tasty snack is one thing a lot of dogs do. Their owners should be watching to prevent "wolfing it down for a while".

It was like whole raw onions with the brown papery bits still on - but he could have just eaten the noodles/whatever else was in there rather than going straight for onion. He’s 13kg, a spaniel.

Honestly can't see any dog eating raw onions!

Get a Labrador. You'll see it eating things that turn your stomach and scar you for life.

My dog has literally just 5mins ago vomited over the floor, I noticed some tiny bits of chopped onion in it, kids had burgers so he must have pinched some from there. I’m guessing if your dog had eaten whole onions he’d be throwing them back up to.

Onions are very toxic, they cause hemolytic anaemia.
It really depends on how much he ate but if it was my dog I’d be feeding activated charcoal (all pet shops should sell it) and phone the vet for advice.

All aliens are toxic to dogs but they don't cause kidney failure as a pp suggested. They cause gastrointestinal upset, breakdown of red blood cells/anaemia, collapse and even death.

Severity of symptoms depends on how much is eaten. Interestingly poisoning is cumulative so small amounts regularly can eventually cause symptoms like a single larger dose would.
More info here:

vcahospitals.com/know-your-pet/onion-garlic-chive-and-leek-toxicity-in-dogs

All vets legally have to provide 24 hour care even if that means there's a separate designated out of hours service, the information will be on the answerphone message.

Alliums not aliens

I’ve called the emergency vet and they’re going to call me back when the vet is available.

Yep, my 12kg terrier had to have an emetic as she snarfed half a big cooked onion.

Vet didn't want to take the chance. I looked up the lethal dose and it was marginal but I didn't want to take the chance.

Thank you everyone!

Aliens

🐩

@Veterinari you said poisoning is cumulative, I’ve never fed them, but a number of pet companies like Dorwest and Johnson’s sell garlic tablets, which being an allium should be toxic in large doses?
If the garlic tablets are fed everyday does that mean then that over time they could make the dog sick..?

I've had lots of out of hours trips where I've been sat in a room with my greedy greyhound waiting for him to puke up the raisins/avocado stone/grapes after they've administered the morphine injection. It's really tedious but I'd rather do it than be worried watching him for signs of renal failure.

He always looks really sorry for himself but never learns. We are getting more vigilant ourselves at least.

To update in case anyone else needs to know... Vet said he thinks it’s unlikely he’s eaten enough to be an issue, and to go into the vet’s on Friday to get a blood test, followed by another blood test on Monday to see if he shows any sign of anaemia. He said that if he’s sick/has diarrhoea that’s normal and not to be concerned. Dog is now asleep next to me.

[quote MrsAntiSocial]@Veterinari you said poisoning is cumulative, I’ve never fed them, but a number of pet companies like Dorwest and Johnson’s sell garlic tablets, which being an allium should be toxic in large doses?
If the garlic tablets are fed everyday does that mean then that over time they could make the dog sick..?[/quote]
I think they'd need to eat a lot of tablets. For example the dorwest tablets contain only 30mg of garlic. A single garlic clove is about 5 grams so you need about 167 garlic tablets to get the same dose as a single garlic clove.

Then you need to reach the toxicity threshold which is fairly high for garlic - about 15grams/kg body weight. Thats 2-3cloves of garlic per kg body weight but around 500 garlic tablets per kg body weight.

So I guess in a small dog getting daily garlic tabs it is possible to reach toxicity but it would take some time.

Thanks for the update @MaryLennoxsScowl
I’m pleased you were able to speak to the vet. I hope DDog stays well! The worry they cause us!!