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Alert: Splintering dog treat under investigation
By David S. Greene
March 15, 2010
Real Ham Bone for Dogs could be a real problem: Dogs are reported to be sickened or killed after ingesting Dynamic Pet Products’ “Real Ham Bone for Dogs,” carrying the Frick’s Quality Meats label. According to the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, the Better Business Bureau of St. Louis has issued an alert saying the treats, made from 8-inch smoked pork femur bones, are splintering, creating intestinal blockages and death.
According to the BBB, a veterinarian who surgically removed bone fragments from one of the dogs said, “Things like this shouldn’t happen. If you can’t say it’s safe, it probably isn’t something you should have in stores.”
ConsumerAffairs.com has received similar complaints. The bones are sold in stores such as Dollar General, as well as supermarkets nationwide. Where is the FDA, you ask? They are looking into it. Meanwhile, the company in question is quoted in a post from omidog saying, well, you can read it here:
The company said Thursday it was saddened to learn of the illnesses and deaths of customers’ pets, and that quality and safety remain priorities. The packaging contains a warning about the product not being for all dogs, and the possibility that it could splinter.
“That is why every package contains a label that provides detailed instructions to owners on how they can help their pets best enjoy our products,” the company said in a statement. “We strongly encourage owners to supervise their pets with any treats or snacks.”
If you have any of these treats in your home, you might want to consider not feeding them to your dogs and taking them back to the store.
Grace’s Law passes Rules Committee: The Georgia House of Representatives will vote tomorrow on final passage of Grace’s Law. The bill is largely the product of a grassroots effort led by the Georgia Voters for Animal Welfare (GVAW). Grace’s Law would outlaw the gassing or heartsticking (injecting lethal drugs directly into the heart of a conscious animal) of shelter pets in the state, and it was reported out of the Rules Committee on Thursday. The full text of the bill, denoted HB 788, is here. Here’s the reality: Passage of the bill isn’t anything close to guaranteed. The vote could go either way. If you live in Georgia, please call your representative. If you have friends or relatives in Georgia (as I do), kindly pass this along to them. From Valerie Hayes’ Examiner.com article on the bill:
It is particularly important that residents of counties which still use the gas chamber to kill shelter pets call or write in support of Grace’s Law. They are:
1. Ashburn, City of (In Turner County; no county facility; chamber housed in city.)
2. Butts County Animal Control
3. Cobb County Animal Control
4. Cordele, City of (Crisp County)
5. Cuthbert, City of (In Randolph County; no county facility; chamber housed in city.)
6. Haralson County Animal Shelter
7. Hawkinsville, City of (In Pulaski County; no county facility; chamber housed in city.)
8. Henry County Animal Control
9. Lakeland, City of (In Lanier County; no county facility; chamber housed in city.)
10. Mitchell County Animal Control
11. Vienna, City of Animal Shelter (In Dooly County; no county facility; chamber housed in city.)
Bedbugs? Put a dog on the case. Let me state at the outset that this topic makes my skin crawl, but as your intrepid news editor, it’s my responsibility to pass it along. Bedbugs are making a resurgence, and you might be surprised to know that one of the best possible methods of detection is a properly trained bedbug-sniffing dog. The New York Times explains.
Bedbug-sniffing dogs, adorable yet stunningly accurate — entomology researchers at the University of Florida report that well-trained dogs can detect a single live bug or egg with 96 percent accuracy — are the new and furry front line in an escalating and confounding domestic war.[...]
Consider that six years ago, there were 537 bedbug complaints and 82 violations (in other words, verified infestations); last year, complaints topped out at nearly 11,000, with 4,084 violations cited (nearly double that of the previous year).
Didn’t bedbugs used to be less of a problem? Yes. In the 1950′s and ’60′s, they were mostly eradicated with pesticides like DDT, which have since been banned. However, many countries overseas still have bedbug infestations, and increased international travel has brought the critters back to our shores.
Fuji’s new pet camera: Are you in the market for a new digital camera? Got a pet? I’m assuming the answer to the second question is yes, otherwise why are you here? Our buddy Maria Goodavage over at Dogster spotlighted an intriguing new product from Fujifilm: the FinePix Z700EXR compact camera. Digital cameras have featured face recognition capability for some years now. The FinePix Z700EXR goes one step better: It recognizes and optimizes photographic capture of pet faces — both dog and cat, though Maria, understandably, just talked about the dog part (she writes for Dogster, not Catster). The camera looks pretty snazzy, and there are pets it’s particularly good at capturing, but it has some potentially annoying limitations, including:
- it doesn’t do quite so well with black, or predominately black pets (Gina just frowned)
- it’s not good with pets who are constantly in motion (sorry, FayBee, and Christie’s soon-to-be-arriving puppy)
- pets with large, predominately dark, patches around the eyes and/or nose, won’t be recognized as well
- wrinkly, short, muzzled faces (sorry, Mikkel’s pug Willy)
However, if you have a beagle, golden retriever, Maltese, Abyssinian, Maine coon, or any of the breeds shown here, feel free to send me a camera review.
I always like to hear from readers, especially if you have tips, and links for interesting stories. Give me a shout in the comments, or better yet, send me an e-mail.
Photo credits: Ham Bone, baltimoresun.com. Grace, Phil Draughon.
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Tell Fuji to call when they have something that will work with my black schnauzers, and the perpetual motion puppies. I can already get great pics of the corgwyn posing by the fireplace.
”* it doesn’t do quite so well with black, or predominately black pets”
Comment by schnauzer — March 15, 2010 @ 7:52 am
I wonder how this camera would do with tortoiseshell cats. Sounds like it might fall under the limitations for pets with dark patches around the face. I’d love to hear from people who have actually used this camera. Failing that, I’d love to hear tips and tricks about how to get good photos of dark colored pets in general!
Comment by Ingrid King — March 15, 2010 @ 9:23 am
I’ve taken something in the neighborhood of 15,098,876,890 pictures of black dogs, including my favorite: The image of my three of my dogs at the bottom of this page.
My best advice remains: Understand that 15,098,876,581 pictures will be deleted as worthless.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — March 15, 2010 @ 9:39 am
“Where is the FDA, you ask? They are looking into it.”
Seems the FDA is famous (or should I say infamous?) for “looking into it.” Meanwhile, pets get sick, and/or die.
Comment by Marcy — March 15, 2010 @ 10:03 am
You pretty well nailed it, Marcy. Thanks for catching the tone I was trying to convey.
Comment by David S. Greene — March 15, 2010 @ 10:09 am
YES-I gave my golden retriever mix one of these bones about a year ago. She was in terrific pain for 2-3 days! Every time she went potty, she whined and her rectum bled! I guess I was just lucky in that it was not worse. I have NEVER purchased any “natural-looking” bones for her again. I complained and Dollar General said they were not responsible. FDA needs to do something!
Comment by Bev — March 15, 2010 @ 12:50 pm
The dog treat thing sounds similar to the Greenies problem. Didnt they eventually take those out of stores and sell them at vet offices and if I recall they blamed the store clerks for not selling the correct Greenie for the correct dog and there was also some blame applied to pet owners by the company. I think those are still being sold on-line so it must be that pet owners who buy on-line are smarter than the ones that buy in stores? Sorry for the snark.
Comment by Sandi K — March 15, 2010 @ 1:45 pm
Reminds me of the “bell in pimple ball” that was recalled, but not before several dogs losing their tongues (!!!) and lives because they couldn’t eat. Sheesh. Oh, and with a mostly black GSD and a seal-point Siamese wannabe, guess I’ll have to rely on my 30,000 bad shots to one good one. At least it’s not wasted film like the old days when my brother processed all my slides, LOL! Digital rules!
Great column!
Comment by Amy D Shojai, CABC — March 15, 2010 @ 7:01 pm
Maybe I don’t understand Fuji’s recognition system, but as anyone who has had experience w/ spitz type dogs, sometimes it is difficult to tell a Shiba from a Jindo from a Norwegian Buhund and the Norbottenspet and Lundhund look as though they might other spitz mixes…
Comment by glock — March 15, 2010 @ 8:53 pm
Glock: the terminology may be throwing you off. By “recognition”, FujiFilm is saying that the camera software recognizes that it’s seeing a pet’s face. It doesn’t claim (or need to) to discern the difference between a Shiba and a Jindo or any one breed from any other. It’s just a matter of focusing in on the subject. There are some breeds whose faces are more easily detectable, and therefore recognizable as a face the camera can focus in on. The limitations discussed in the column apply to any breed (dog or cat) with those particular characteristics.
Comment by David S. Greene — March 15, 2010 @ 9:05 pm
OK, thanks for the explanation. If they had said, will be able to recognize (“focus on”) dogs with spitz type facial configuration such as…it might have made more sense.
Comment by glock — March 15, 2010 @ 9:15 pm
The reason it’s important for a camera to recognize that it’s pointed at a dog or cat, not a person is that the color-correction process many cameras do automatically to fix “red-eye” in people needs different parameters for dogs and cats. Their eyes are different, more geared for motion and low-light conditions. Because of this, they reflect back light differently than peoples’ eyes do.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — March 16, 2010 @ 7:19 am
Um … it’s a cooked bone, so it’s going to splinter and it’s a ham bone, so it spent hours absorbing the strong saline solution that meat processors use to cure hams rapidly for the mass market. Why is anyone feeding it to their dogs?
Comment by Kimba — March 16, 2010 @ 5:03 pm
Um … it’s a cooked bone, so it’s going to splinter and it’s a ham bone, so it spent hours absorbing the strong saline solution that meat processors use to cure hams rapidly for the mass market. Why is anyone feeding it to their dogs?
Comment by Kimba — March 16, 2010
Because there’s an assumption that it wouldn’t be offered for sale if it were not safe. Let’s not blame the victims here.
During the pet-food recall, we had a lot of people snarking that if people didn’t [feed cheap food/feed a brand that many don’t like/make food at home/etc/etc] they wouldn’t have poisoned their pet. That it was their OWN FAULT because they “should have known better.”
That’s bullshit. We at PetConnection believe that the very LEAST everyone should be able to expect from a food, treat or toy is that it not sicken or kill a pet. We did not turn the pet-food recall into a “you should have known better” fest then, and we’re not doing it now.
This was sold to the public, and safety was a fair assumption for a dog-owner to make.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — March 16, 2010 @ 6:11 pm
Kimba, also note that in some parts of the world, “ham” is a cut of meat, not necessarily a cured pork product.
Comment by K.B. — March 16, 2010 @ 6:55 pm