by Janet Farricelli CPDT-KA

Created on: December 14, 2008

After moving to a home where I knew the previous tenant was an avid smoker, my dogs made me notice that along with the terrible smell of smoke on carpets and curtains, the tenant had also left a whole yard full of cigarette butts. Little did I know that my dogs somehow were attracted to these cigarette butts, until I clearly witnessed them chewing them and eating them.

For some odd reason, my dogs were not the only ones on this planet that seemed to enjoy tobacco, as I read over the Internet, I discovered that every year many dogs ingest cigarettes and cigarette butts. Not only is this a bad habit, but even a dangerous one: nicotine is harmful to our pets and nicotine toxicity is a true fact.

Concerned, I decided to clean up my yard as much as I could. It appears that dogs are not only attracted to cigarettes but basically to anything that contains tobacco, such as, cigars, snuff, chewing tobacco,nicotine gum and even nicotine patches! According to Dr. Dawn Ruben onPetplace.com:

"The toxic level of nicotine in dogs is 5 milligrams of nicotine per pound of body weight. The butt of a cigarette can contain from 4 to 8 milligrams depending on the length of the butt and the content of the original cigarette. Cigarette butts have a deceptively large amount of tobacco relative to the size of the butt as smoking concentrates some of the nicotine in the cigarette butt."

It appears that the level of toxicity depends on various factors such as the dog's weight, the cigarette brand and the amount ingested. While many dogs will vomit shortly after ingestion, some may develop very worrisome symptoms such as:

Instability

Weakness

Tremors

Hyperactivity

Drooling

Vo miting

Diarrhea

Seizures

Collapse

Inability to breath

Death (in severe cases)

Treatment

So now that you have witnessed your dog ingesting cigarette butts what to do? If your dog ingested a toxic amount, has not vomited and the ingestion occurred less than 2 hours ago you can induce vomiting using 3% hydrogen peroxide and consulting with your vet for proper dosage instructions. However, in many cases hospitalization is required. Dogs affected by nicotine toxicity may require a gastric lavage, IV fluids and activated charcoal. Sever cases may require a ventilator to allow breathing.

The outcome of nicotine ingestion depends on several factors. It seems that how promptly treatment is applied plays a major role in recovery and so is the amount ingested. As a general rule of thumb should the dog survive the first 5 hours post ingestion the prognosis is pretty good. Keep in mind though that it takes up to 20 hours for the nicotine to totally leave the body.

As for my dogs, my 14 month Rottweiler Kaiser, kept on mouthing the cigarette butts for a while. Frustrated, I told him "drop it" a command he learned since a puppy. So he dropped it promptly. To reward him I gave him a treat, I always keep them in my pocket. Little did I know that he was smart enough to start bringing me all the cigarette butts he found, dropped them at my feet and traded them for my treats. In less than an hour the whole yard was immaculately clear of cigarette butts.I told him "good boy" and finally I could "kiss the cigarette's butts good bye".

http://www.petplace.com/dogs/nicotine-toxicity-in-do gs/page1.aspx

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