Hydrangeas and dogs?

ked1985

8 years ago

I know they are fairly poisonous to canines. Do you ever worry that your dog will eat them? My SO is a little PO'ed that I planted another hydrangea in the back this week :/ Our hound is never out there unsupervised though and has shown no interest in any of the plants. There are so many plants that are toxic in general... how do you garden with your pooch in mind?

Comments (5)

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
8 years ago
Have gardened with dogs all my life and with never a concern about the plants in my garden. They have never showed any interest in eating or even chewing on any of them. Puppies that like to dig or chew may be another issue but adult dogs are much smarter than many give them credit for :-) Since I grew many quite toxic plants (much more so than any hydrangea), I was more concerned about my child and the plants but even she while still quite little was easy to train not to put anything from outdoors in her mouth.

The only concern I had gardening with my dogs was to avoid planting something in their immediate travel paths - they like to patrol the fenceline and anything not very substantial in their way would be trampled. And to avoid highly "fragrant" organic supplements like blood or bone meal, which they would immediately root into. I also had one rather dumb dog that made herself sick eating dead slugs (killed using either salt or pet safe Sluggo) but that was only a temporary - and messy - stomach issue :-)
luis_pr
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
I can vouch on that. I have not had problems with hydrangeas either although all my dogs were not puppies when I got them. No problems with hydrangeas or azaleas. However, I lost some hydrangea plants when my dogs (German Shepherd, Golden Retriever, Border Collie, Lab... all mutts) declared war on squirrels and the plants were on a solid line between the dogs and the squirrels! Hee hee hee! $$ $$ $$. Sniff, sniff.
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Hydrangeas ARE toxic. I listed some sites to check for information under madeyna's other post. You could copy and paste the sites to read information, or do a Google search under Hydrangea Toxicity like I did. You will turn up a number of locations to read about toxicity for dogs, cats and horses. Most animals do seem to leave the poison stuff alone if given the choice. Other animals don't, so you don't plant toxic stuff or must enclose it so they can't chew the sticks and leaves. My Hydrangea bushes have rabbit fences in winter, because rabbits DID nibble them the last couple years. My silly young dog seems to develop a chewing need in winter. So fencing the shrubs means they get protected from her as well and she is not endangered because she is young and silly. I try to give her sticks that are OK to chew, like non-toxic Witch Hazel and Honeysuckle, trimmed already to keep the fence clean. Seems to be just her, the other dog doesn't NEED to chew sticks like that. Anyway, sites are helpful to check on things you might plan to plant. I have had to cross off some lovely trees I wanted, because they are extremely poison to horses. I can't take a chance of leaves getting nibbled after they fall, since they will kill the horses. Only takes a few leaves, they are that toxic. Common stuff, like Acer Rubrum, the beautifully colored Maple everyone buys for their yard. I know some folks who lost horses that nibbled a couple dried leaves that fell in the paddock. Horse was dead in less than an hour. Buckeye family is very bad, lots of lovely trees and shrubs in that. I check those lists quite often when considering new plantings, they didn't used to have such information commonly available before the Internet.
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Liz Gallardo
8 years ago
Mine has only ever eaten vegetables off the vine! I know the harvest is ready when he sneaks in with a jalapeño or a tiny watermelon!
ruth_mi
8 years ago
I dog sit for my son, and the dog (part hound) has never shown any interest at all in my garden. She'll munch grass in a wild area close by, but has never touched a hydrangea, and I have tons of them. But ditto what luis said - when the dog is chasing squirrels or chipmunks, plants can get trampled.
luis_pr
8 years ago
And what is that deal with eating grass??? It seems to be related to stomach issues but where did this come from??? I have n-e-v-e-r- seen the dogs read a newspaper that told them to eat grass for stomach problems! Hee hee hee! Just today at 4am-ish... let me stress that again, at 4AM.... I had to take one of the dogs out. She woke me up and went on to eat grass for who knows how long. I almost fell asleep waiting in the sofa. LOL! But I guess, as leader of the pack, I was supposed to do that for her. :o)

Hydrangeas and dogs?

Comments (5)

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)

luis_pr

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