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New toy warning

JeanKC

Well-known member
This ball (smaller than a regular tennis ball, bigger than the mini-tennis balls) is at PetSmart for cheap... less than $2. Similar 'soccer' ball, and one other solid color I think. It feels and bounces like hard rubber, and has some heft to it... so we figured it would be safe. After realizing Elvis was much more interested in it than usual with balls, we noticed he (they'd) eaten a good part of it. Inside, it feels like NERF material, but a little denser. Another curious thing... this morning the poohs with pieces of orange ball in it was covered with ants. Never seen ants in the pooh before, and none of the other poohs this morning.

ball1.jpg


ball2.jpg
 
Thanks for the caution. Your experience is a good reminder to all of us to always watch dogs carefully with any new toys as dogs can really vary in what they do with toys and whether they are inclined to destroy them. I have some of those balls (for a long time -- maybe a year two now) and have had no problem -- mine aren't really chewers though. It's also a good idea to only leave toys that are known to be extra safe with dogs when you aren't there (eg not rope toys, or anything that could be de-stuffed, unwound, chewed into pieces etc).

When you say there were ants in his poo do you mean he passed the ants or they gathered on the poo after? If he passed them then he must have been eating them -- and are you sure they were ants and not some other internal parasite where he passed a lot of them in one initial poo? If he passed these things I'd want to get him to the vet in for a fecal sample as that sounds pretty strange!
 
We didn't see the poohing, but if he they had ants like this in them, they'd be goners already. :eek: I'm talking covered with swarming ants like you might see on a puddle of CocaCola at the picnic grounds. We do have fire ants here, but I've not noticed them in the yard before, and with as many dogs as we have, pooh duty is a daily (at least!) affair. I had to wonder if it was something in the ball material that attacted the ants.

As you mentioned, about the only kind of toys we can have the Kong-type rubber. Elvis will systematically unravel any variety of rope, and destroy material of any sort. Any stuffed type anything has a lifespan of minutes. They had this ball for maybe two hours... it certainly fooled me.
 
Mine will only play with fluffy balls and that's only to retrieve. however, some years ago I bought a toy based on a film character (the film was about dogs from space) . It is a long dog with a rattle at one end, a squeaky at the other and a stretchy spring along it's length. Mine only ever played under supervision and is still intact, but someone on another forum, said their cavalier ripped his open and revealed that the rattle was filled with sharp plastic spikes. The owner complained to the manufacturer, but no further post was made about it.

I would never buy the , very popular in shops, toys with protruding, although fabric, eyes, as they are just asking to be nibbled off. I think too many toys are made to appeal to the owner aesthetically , rather than being robust and safe.
 
We bought a toy from petco awhile back that had these little plastic spikes on them on a ring, then with a butterfly on the end. Bailey ate a whole bunch of the little plastic spikes, he somehow chewed them all off, and then became constipated because I think it hurt to get them out. They were VERY tiny, and eventually all came out, but we took that toy away and have never bought one like it since.

I saw them on clearance at Petco a few weeks later, and a lady was looking at them, so I told her, and she's thanked me, and put it back. I agree, it's so important to watch them with new toys. We try to buy things that are indestructible now if can lol, because Bailey is a big chewer with his toys.
 
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