Dog owners - new danger to your 4 footed friends

[Artful]

Veterinarians are warning that a sugar substitute in certain brands of peanut butter is highly toxic to dogs.

Dr. Bryan Langlois, medical director at the Pet Pantry of Lancaster County, said the sweetener called xylitol can cause both liver damage as well as dangerous drops in a dog’s blood sugar level.

“I am currently aware of only three brands that are using xylitol in their peanut butter,” Langlois said in a statement. “They are Nuts’ n More, P28, and Nutty by Nature. So far, it appears these brands are only found in health food stores and are intended for people who are more into the intense exercise and body building regimens.”

Langlois urged pet owners to check the label of the peanut butter they buy in case the company changes ingredients.

He said xylitol is perfectly safe for humans.

In dogs, signs of the toxicity can include weakness, stumbling, tremors, and even seizures if their blood sugar drops low enough.



added:

These are the 5 companies who sell specialty peanut butters with xylitol in it: (1) Go Nuts, Co., (2) Hank's Protein Plus Peanut Butter, (3) Krush Nutrition, (4) Nuts 'N More, and (5) P28, found mostly in health food stores and online. Big name brands like Jif do not have xylitol in them.


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[35 shooter]

Thanks for the heads up on this. My girlfriend has a little dog that is nuts for anything with peanut butter in it or on it lol.

[M-Tecs]

I will pass that on to the wife. Thanks

[starmac]

Just curious, do many folks actually feed peanut butter to your dogs. I reckon quite a few do for this to even be discovered.

[toallmy]

Thanks for the heads up.when I make a PBJ in the evening I make my girls a peanutbutter . As a treat .

[dragon813gt]

Just curious, do many folks actually feed peanut butter to your dogs. I reckon quite a few do for this to even be discovered.

Only time mine gets it as at the Vets. They give it to me on a stick to distract him while they do their testing. They recommend it as a safe treat for dogs. The brand we have is safe but I still don't give him any. Thanks for the heads up about this.

[M-Tecs]

Just curious, do many folks actually feed peanut butter to your dogs. I reckon quite a few do for this to even be discovered.

The wife uses it when she has to give them a pill and she gives them the container when it empty.

[LeadThrower]

Thanks for the heads up! We use organic PB, but I'll pass the word along to my friends.

[Electric88]

My understanding is that Xylitol is a natural sweetener used by many people who want to get away from the heavily processed sugars. I haven't really ever seen it at any large stores (Walmart, Meijer etc) but it can be found in natural food stores. Not only can it be found in peanut butter, but also basically anything else that would be sweet, as well as in a granular form to be used in baking in place of sugar. Typically anything with Xylitol is going to be more expensive than your average jar of peanut butter or box of cookies.

[walltube]

Artful,
Not that I feed our four-legged family member any peanut butter, many thanks for the 'xylitol' warning. I am sure to pass to on to other dog owners.

Grateful Regards,
Wt.

[popper]

Note that not many companies mark their product as using it. Evidently it takes major transfusion to save the pet. Supposedly worse than chocolate.

[montana_charlie]

I guess that if you stick with Jif or Skippy, you are doing it right ...

[Artful]

I used the organic cookies with skippy on them to dose my old dog with med's
- Fish Oil, glucosamine/chondroitin, and Aspirin - it lubed his joints and eased his pains.

[MaryB]

My lab Misty would beg for it, I would put some on a finger then wipe it on the roof of her mouth. She would spend 20 minutes licking it off! If I made a peanut butter sandwich I got the share that stare...

[fecmech]

I use peanut butter when I have to give my dog a pill. I put peanut butter on the end of my RH middle finger and stick the pill to it. I hold her jaw open with my left hand and put the pill down her throat. Works great! If you have to give a dog any gel capsule drugs you can just dampen your finger with saliva and stick the capsule to it.

[birddog]

Huh, I'll feed it to the wife and see what happens to her and save the dog!!! *****
Charlie

[facetious]

Our vet has this posted with a display of things that have it in it. She said that a dog eating a piece of gum was enough to kill them.

Peanut butter should only have two ingredients, peanuts and salt!

[buckwheatpaul]

Artful, Thank You for the Heads Up! Paul

[DCP]

Good info to have Thank you

[bertus]

Chocolate can be dangerous as well

[4rdwhln]

My two dogs get the last bite of my pb toast every morning, always use jif. Since early childhood I was aware other company's made a ground up peanut product..it is all second rate when you put it up against good old jif.
It sure seams as if all the synthetic sugar substitute's are harmful in one way or other. My wife and I avoid them all.
In the event your dog eats something bad for them, like our Shiba Inu eating a dozen raw chocolate chip cookies off the sheet while my wife baked them, two tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide down her throat had her puking up the cookies in seconds. In our doggie emergency response kit is a syringe and the peroxide...we were amazed at how many she ate in a moment of distraction.

[slohunter]

My lab Misty would beg for it, I would put some on a finger then wipe it on the roof of her mouth. She would spend 20 minutes licking it off! If I made a peanut butter sandwich I got the share that stare...
Ditto, cheap thrills!

[smokeywolf]

We've been buying the same peanut butter for 30 years. Ingredients are: Peanuts and Salt. No sweeteners.

[toallmy]

I have a couple little Shiba Inu girl dogs as well ,they have some strange habits , but are beautiful and sweat Hard Headed comes to mind. Yes they expect their ( as my wife calls it ) pocket peanut butter goodie . The neighbors get a kick out of me calling them .Come on girls. Got to love a good dog.

[smokeywolf]

Somebody mentioned chocolate as bad for dogs, very true. Also:

Onions
Grapes
Raw Salmon
Macadamia nuts
Apple cores.

Also, don't let them have too much cheese, bacon or other high fat foods as an overdose of fat can lead to pancreatitis (sp).

[smokeywolf]

I have a couple little Shiba Inu girl dogs as well ,they have some strange habits , but are beautiful and sweat Hard Headed comes to mind. Yes they expect their ( as my wife calls it ) pocket peanut butter goodie . The neighbors get a kick out of me calling them .Come on girls. Got to love a good dog.

Shiba is the prefecture in Japan where the breed originates. "Inu" is Japanese for "dog".

[Ola]

Xylitol is great stuff. It comes from the birch tree and is totally harmless to humans if you don't eat too much of it (laxative).
The main point of xylitol is it's ability to kill bacteria in your mouth: chewing some xylitol chewing gum after every meal is highly recommended way of preventing cavities. So basically every household here has some xylitol chewing cum in it. And our kids are consuming it a lot.

We also know it is toxic to dogs. Dogs metabolism is fooled by xylitol: the body treats xylitol like it is sugar. But it is not, so the insuline-system goes nuts (hypoglycemia).

The rule of thumb: the amount of xylitol has to be quite high to cause trouble if the dog weighs f.e. 40 lbs. So a little amount of that peanut butter wont kill it. But a whole jar, that is another story. Or if the dog weighs less than 10 lbs..

Additional info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xylitol#Xylitol_toxicity_in_dogs

[shdwlkr]

and I thought the greatest threat to my pet dog was the police coming to visit

[Ola]

and I thought the greatest threat to my pet dog was the police coming to visit Relax. It still is.

[shdwlkr]

Yea I was afraid of that