Dog Just Poisoned to Death by Cantharidin!

[FlyHigher]

Last night my dog Toby(50days old) was dead on the room floor with white foam out of his mouth...
Finally I managed to find out what happened to him -- he'd eaten a dead Cantharidin which was killed and left on the room floor!
Feel so sad. I've heard cantharidins are poisonous, but never thought dog would eat these stinky bugs....

I have several free-range chickens in the yard, and I just wonder that if chickens will eat cantharidins...
If so, it would be disastrous, because it's pretty difficult to keep chickens away from them...

 

[Mtn Laurel]

Last night my dog Toby(50days old) was dead on the room floor with white foam out of his mouth...
Finally I managed to find out what happened to him -- he'd eaten a dead Cantharidin which was killed and left on the room floor!
Feel so sad. I've heard cantharidins are poisonous, but never thought dog would eat these stinky bugs....

I have several free-range chickens in the yard, and I just wonder that if chickens will eat cantharidins...
If so, it would be disastrous, because it's pretty difficult to keep chickens away from them...

So very sad. I'm so sorry for your loss. Who would think that simply eating a bug would do such?

I've never heard of this beetle. From what I'm finding, they're called "Blister Beetles" and cantharidin is the toxic substance in the beetle. I'm reading warnings about horses ingesting one specific type of this beetle but nothing about other animals. My daughter has been a vet tech for about 7 years and she's not heard of it and hasn't treated any animals that have gotten sick from one.

Possibly the young age of your puppy had something to do with such a severe reaction. I need to learn more about this and how to identify these beetles to keep them away from my dogs, cat, and chickens.

 

[FlyHigher]

Thanks for the reply, mtnlaurl.

Generally, animals will not eat such bugs on purpose, since they are kind of ugly and can release a stink smoke if they feel in danger.

But dead bugs will be another thing, I really don't know what animals think when they see dead Blister Beetles.Just hope they will not be interested by them.

Maybe my poor Toby was just too young to know these dangers.Anyway, this is a good lesson for me.

 

[Imp]

Oh Gosh, I am so sorry. That's tragic. I've never heard of this before.

Imp- sadly