Dogsey

I don't like the logic that's being presented in this article. By their logic I shouldn't drive because I might get in a car accident, shouldn't go to work because the floor might be wet from mopping and I might slip, shouldn't walk down my basement stairs do to laundry, because I might fall. I'm sure this girl's experience was traumatic, but I think they are going a little overboard with the reaction. You can't protect your dog from everything, all you can do is to make sure they are fed, groomed, exercised, and have proper shelter.

My friend used to be a vet nurse for the PDSA. One day, a dog came in, bleeding from a splinter from chomping on a stick.

The vet nurse examined, and said he just needed some gas to cortorise (sp?) the cut.

Sadly, he had a splinter in his artery and bled out on the table. There was nothing they could do.

Thankfully, my girl has no interest in sticks now, there are safer options, I always encourage those.

DexNjj, but if you KNEW something was dangerous, and there were easy, safer alternatives available, why wouldn't you use them? Its not hard to carry a safe fetching toy with you. I've seen lots of stick related injuries and will not allow my dog to play with them. I think if you KNOW something is potentially fatally harmful, but you do it anyway, then you are a negligent pet owner.

Nothing in life is risk free.

We have to guage the probability of something happening and the severity of its consequences.

Sadly for some, and happily for others, we know this is not an isolated incident so that we can take precautions to prevent our dogs suffering from an entirely forseeable and preventable injury.

http://www.colliecorner.com/stick-to-toys/home.htm

If we fail to learn from the mistakes of others, then what does that make us?

Must of been horrifying for the family to see and the dog to endure.

I am glad Maggie has recovered.

Dexnjj - I've never thrown sticks for any of the dogs I've had over the years. When I was about 12 yrs old I saw a friends dog die after the stick it was chasing stuck into the ground, the dog continued running and was impailed on the stick Something I will never forget.

I have to agree with muttzrule & SBs posts.

Such an important message.

I have personally known one fatality, one with a hole in the roof of it's mouth and lucky to be alive and another who was operated on for a 6 inch stick stuck in its intestines all because they played with sticks.

Don't do it - it really isn't worth the risk

I don't disagree with the assertion that sticks can be dangerous, I'm just saying that the writing style in the article is a little too alarmist for my taste. I think they could have made such a valid point in a better way. As I said above, I do many dangerous things on a daily basis, should I stop doing laundry just because the stairs are steep or stop going to work just because it's dangerous to drive a car?

No you do not do many dangerous things on a daily basis.

You do some activities which, under certain conditions, could be classed as dangerous.

Eg if you drove a car with bald tyres, no MOT, above the speed limit in the fog whilst unlicensed, THIS would be consdered as "dangerous".

I am a H & S professional and activities and tasks are risk assessed by professionals in work and by ordinary people every day of their lives.

For example, when you decide to move out at a roundabout, you make a dynamic risk assessment based on the environmental conditions, speed of traffic etc etc

And thus it is with all activities in life.

One of the sources of information upon which to base risk assessments is previous history, that is how your car insurance, home insurance and pet insurance is calculated.

So, we have prior knowledge that sticks + dogs = disaster, therefore most of us would conclude from the data available that this activity is not NECESSARY, is entirely AVOIDABLE and thus all risk could be ELIMINATED.

Driving is often necessary, unavoidable and thus cannot be eliminated thus various controls are put in place such as:

lessons
licences
MOTs
Insurance
speed limits
signs
road surfaces etc

But you are right several people are killed each year as a result of just getting out of bed!