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Backyard apples


Kathryn

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We have an old apple tree in our back yard, and it has never -- in more than 20 years anyway -- had as many apples on it as it does this year. Last Sunday DH and I picked up 20 boxes of fallen apples from the yard and, before we even got inside, more started to fall. They are a type of summer apple, and they are a little soft. We don't spray the tree so we just let the animals have them. In August the yard is always full of birds, squirrels and the occasional raccoon.

Unfortunately, the animals eating the apples now include our own T-Bone. I let him eat an apple the first time he picked one up -- BIGGGG mistake. Now he isn't interested in his "business" when we send him out to the yard. He hightails it to the apples, picks a good one, and settles in on the porch to eat it. When he finishes one, he'd find another and just keep noshing if we let him. I don't think it's good to let him eat that many apples, so we're taking him out on the leash each and every time he goes to the door.

Wish I could send a photo of T lying down on the porch with his apple in his mouth -- he looks just like those roast pigs, right down to his silly smile... :D

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Our dogs are apple lovers too, but luckily we don't have a tree. I give them each a couple of slices every day, and they have come to expect it. I have read that the apple seeds are toxic to dogs, so I would make sure your T-Bone doesn't eat the whole apple, seeds and all.

Jim, Connie, Bailey & Sophie

FLOWERCHILD-1-1.jpgBAILEYSOPHIE4-22-07002-1.jpg

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I have a cherry tree in my back garden. Abby loves to eat the cherries that the birds shake loose from the tree. Not to be too graphic - but during cherry season she has been known to poop nothing but pits. <_< I am constantly out there picking up as many cherries as I can before she eats them. Funnily enough, even though both of mine like apples the few that fall in my garden from my neighbor's tree are left on the ground - even though most have big bites taken out of them by squirrels or birds.

I would just make sure she is eating only the apple flesh. Even though the pips have a type of cyanide (amygdalin) in them (many fruit pips do) I would not be concerned. Most likely they are exiting in the same state they went in ... Nevertheless, too much of the core and the pips cannot be good on the digestive system.

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I have an apple monster too! At my old office there were three big old apple trees that lined the lawn where we always had the dogs play. It was funny - he loved apples in the kitchen when I'd eat one at home, but didn't associate the ones on the ground with the slices of yumminess from home until he saw a kid pick one up and eat it. Currey thought the apples were toys at first and we'd play fetch with them, but then he figured out that they were yummy, too! He loved to play with one first for 5 or 10 minutes and then chow down, but I'd always just let him have about 1/4 of one before I took it away so he'd not eat the seeds and so we wouldn't have icky poop the next day.

Cairnmania...oh my, I have such a mental image right now! :sick: I've never let mine have cherries because of the pits...but now that I know they go safely the whole way through....

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When we had a hawthorne tree in our back yard, our kids would eat as many as the birds did...and yes, they too would be pooping nothing but berries. It looked like they didn't even digest them, just in one end and out the other. Now my boy LOVES MANGO and oranges, every time I try to peel a mango or orange, the smell gets him right by my side. He can get so demanding the the barking will only stop if he thinks he get some, usually a little does some good. The girls, well when they see him get something...they think they need one too.

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CeCe used to actually stand on her hind legs to pick fruit of the trees and Jock was once caught up in the bird netting around the cherry tree. We once had a young tree that was just starting to bear its first fruit, my dad looked at the lone mandarin (or whatever it was) and said "we'll pick it in a few days" and sure enough when we went to pick if off the tree it had disappeared... naughty CeCe got to it first!

Oddly enough Jock's favourite food is carrots :confused1:

- Chris

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sheila and Misty

those apple (like a catnip)s-Misty loves them too actually so much you would think I was eating a juicy raw steak the way she comes running for some, doesnt even react that way to actual meat-I believe these cairns really love their fruit and veggies-unusual to me. I wouldnt worry about the apples so much as the seeds and toxins and if I get stuck with t.p.duty after each outing. Hmmm! not a comforting thought ...sissors-lots of T.p. wipeys an possible bath! but look at it this way natural food not sprayed-and possibly a few worms for added protein :P

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Be careful not to let your cairn eat the apple seeds. Apple seeds are very poisonous to dogs. Here's a link: http://www.canismajor.com/dog/poison.html

Here's more:

Poisonous Plants

Poison plants can prove to be very dangerous if your puppy is allowed to chew on them. Being forewarned is being forearmed. Here is a list of dangerous plants provided by The American Humane Society:

Amaryllis (bulb)

Andromeda

Apple Seeds (Cyanide)

Arrowgrass

Avocado

Azalea

Bittersweet

Boxwood

Buttercup

Caladium

Castor Bean

Cherry Pits (cyanide)

Chokecherry

Climbing Lilly

Crown of Thorns

Daffodil (bulb)

Daphne

Delphinium

Dieffenbachia (houseplant in colder areas)

Dumb Cane ( " " " " " )

Elephant Ear

English Ivy

Elderberry

Foxglove

Hemlock

Holly

Hyacinth (bulb)

Hydrangea

Iris (bulb)

Japanese Yew Jasmine (berries)

Jerusalem Cherry

Jimson Weed

Laburnum

Larkspur

Laurel

Locoweed

Marigold

Marijuana (!)

Mistletoe (berries)

Monkshood

Mushrooms

Narcissus (bulb)

Nightshade

Oleander (even the smoke from burning this plant is poison)

Peach

Philodendron

Poison Ivy

Privet

Rhododendron

Rhubarb

Snow on the Mountain

Stinging Nettle

Toadstool

Tobacco

Tulip (bulb)

Walnut

Wisteria

Yew

Just because a plant is NOT listed here of course does not necessarily mean you should allow your pup or adult dog to eat it or chew on it regularly. As we know, puppies chew indiscriminately during teething. They should always be under supervision outdoors - and all indoor houseplants kept out of reach.

If your dog becomes ill suddenly - with vomiting and/or diarrhea with weakness and/or difficulty breathing, and there is evidence that the dog has chewed on the leaves of ANY plant, get that animal to a vet with several samples of the leaves (or berries or flowers or bulbs or seeds) that were eaten.

Greg and Val Perry

Home of Kula RN CGC, Am. Can. Int'l. CH Cairngorm Coffee Tea or Me RA ME EE2/Can. SE NAJ NAS CGC (Kona), CH Clanmarr's Steele Princess (Hattie) and CH Scotchbroom Thistle The Patriot SE (Sully) Visit: CroftersDream.com

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Greg,

Not to contradict what you've said, but a dog would have to eat large quantities of apple seeds and chew them in order to digest enough cynaide to have any effect. My guess is that most of the seeds go in whole and exit intact, at least that's the way those sort of things work with my dogs. Dogs do not digest cellulous well, so an unchewed seed is an undigested seed.

So caution is in order, but not alarm. :)

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