For dog owners - TOXIC MULCH! Please read!

[transparant]

I just received this email and wanted to share it with all of you DIS dog owners.


COCOA MULCH

Sent to us by Meagan Karnes, of Fur Crazy Pet Care.

Yesterday, one of our clients experienced a tragedy and wanted me to
pass a special message along to all of my dog loving friends and family.
I was hoping you could forward this to your contact list.

My client was the doting owner of two young lab/golden retriever mixes.
Over the weekend, they purchased Cocoa Mulch from Target to use in their
garden. They loved the way it smelled and it was advertised to keep cats
away from their garden. They set the bag in their yard. Their dog
Calypso, decided that the mulch smelled good enough to eat so she broke
into it and devoured a large helping. She vomited a few times which was
typical of her when she would get into something she shouldn?t have
gotten in to. She was not acting lethargic in any way. The next day, Mom
woke up and took Calypso out for her morning walk. Half way through the
walk, she had a seizure and died instantly. Although the mulch had NO
warnings printed on the label, upon further investigation on the
company?s website, this product is HIGHLY toxic to dogs. Denise
(Calypso?s mom) wanted me to pass this information along so no one had
to experience the same tragedy she went through.

In Loving Memory of Calypso.

Cocoa Mulch is manufactured by Hershey's, and they claim that "It is
true that studies have shown that 50% of the dogs that eat Cocoa Mulch
can suffer physical harm to a variety of degrees (depending on each
individual dog). However, 98% of all dogs won't eat it."

True information about the mulch can be found here -
http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/cocoa.htm This site gives the
following information:

Cocoa Mulch, which is sold by Home Depot, Foreman's Garden Supply and
other Garden supply stores, contains a lethal ingredient called
"Theobromine".

It is lethal to dogs and cats. It smells like chocolate and it really
attracts dogs. They will ingest this stuff and die. Several deaths
already occurred in the last 2-3 weeks. Just a word of caution ? check
what you are using in your gardens and be aware of what your gardeners
are using in your gardens.

Theobromine is the ingredient that is used to make all chocolate ?
especially dark or baker's chocolate ? which is toxic to dogs.

Cocoa bean shells contain potentially toxic quantities of theobromine, a
xanthine compound similar in effects to caffeine and theophylline. A dog
that ingested a lethal quantity of garden mulch made from cacao bean
shells developed severe convulsions and died 17 hours later. Analysis of
the stomach contents and the ingested cacao bean shells revealed the
presence of lethal amounts of theobromine.

Please click here to email the manufacturer and request that accurate
information about this product be posted on the packaging to avoid
further tragedy.

And please include Calypso's family in your prayers. Such tragedy is
shocking, made so much worse by the fact that it could have been avoided
had the manufacturers taken some responsibility for their product.

Thank You.


(Attachments

 

[sajetto]

Thank you so much for posting this. I'm going to forward this to my sis since they are planning on new landscaping and have a collie.

So sorry for you friend's loss

 

[phamton]

I see they quoted snopes.com Unfortunately they were not quoting the part that was written by snopes but only the email message that is floating around the internet.

This is what snope says:
"This warning began appearing in our inbox in May 2003. Unlike the majority of scary alerts spread through the Internet there is a good deal of truth to this one, although we've so far been unable to substantiate the claim that "Several deaths already occurred in the last 2-3 weeks."

The rest of the article on snopes does substantiate that it can be harmful or even deadly to pets. So that claim is true.

 

[ashjohnson80]

That is really scary. Thanks for posting.

 

[Free4Life11]

Well the last thing I want in my yard to smell like chocolate!

 

[Sleepy]

We bought some of this last year and there were warnings on the bags for if you had dogs.

 

[TinkInPink]

The dogs have to eat an awful lot of it not just a bite or two. We have this and I have never seen any of the dogs try to eat it. I love it.

 

[Sleepy]

Honestly, we bought this product because of the way it looked, not the way it smelled, because once we got it spread, it was really strong and did not smell like chocolate and after we got a quick rainy week or so, it smelled pretty rotten and looks awful after that. My dog won't go near the stuff. (we got him well after spreading it). I won't buy it again just for the way it smells and looks after getting wet.