Great and informative article and a must read for all those who feed rawhide chews and bones.
I used to give my dogs rawhide treats which they loved (mainly the bones) but I stopped doing that a long time ago. I personally found after they had chewed them for a while, the bones became soft and they would break off the knots, which were not as soft. More often than not my hand ended up in their mouths, to prevent them from choking, trying to dislodge and retrieve these knots,
Even smaller pieces of rawhide, when chewed, to become soft and pliable can get caught at the back of a dogs throat, they can find it very hard to dislodge and possible choking can occur. If larger knots and the like are swallowed they also may cause blockages in the gut.
I have always hoped that someday I would find a connection between the Blues Brothers and dog nutrition. That day has come.
Rawhide, Rawhide: A dog person cannot walk into a pet supply store (or their own grocery store, for that matter) without noticing the explosion in the number of dog chews, dental devices and edible bones that are available for sale today. Some of these are biscuit or extruded concoctions containing a mixture of ingredients, while others originate from cow skin (rawhide chews) or are the left-over body parts of a hapless food animal (pig/lamb ears, hooves, and bully sticks).
If you do not know what a bully stick is, ask your mother. Better yet, ask your father.
Even as the selection of these items has expanded, nutritional information about them is still glaringly absent. Since all of these products are intended to be chewed slowly so that pieces or the entire produce will be gradually consumed by the dog, we should at least be informed…
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