Basenjis and gardens

[wizard]

Seeing jeffb's picture of his dogs smelling the crocus (too cute by the way) reminded me of EL D "helping" me plant some fall bulbs. I'd dig a little hole to plant my bulbs and he'd see what I was doing and dig a new hole nearby (of course he didn't always choose an appropriate spot).

[Barklessdog]

My male does the same thing he loves to help garden- I dig a hole, he helps in the same hole.

I plant a plant, if he sees me doing that, he pulls it out and brings it to me- sometimes killing the expensive plant ($100 dwarf conifer grafts)

I just can't get at mad at him, he's so proud like a cat that caught a mouse, bringing it to you.

This is what they mean about to be a basenji owner you have to have a sense of humor. I always wondered what they meant about that when I first got one.

When our dog was a puppy, my then young son was doing an oil paint by numbers panting. Anyway he left it out to dry, the dog jump up on the place where it was drying, getting black oil paint on his paws then ran all over our new white furniture and carpet. My wife totally freaked!

Surprisingly the oil paint came all the way out with paint thinner, but then the room stunk like paint thinner for a week.

Yes you learn real quite about that sense of humor thing.

[Barklessdog]

As a gardner, be aware that some plants are highly toxic to animals-

The surprising one I discovered was common yews are highly toxic and not the red berries, but everything else on the shrub.

Yew Taxus Spp., Foliage, Bark, Seeds Cardiac, Neurologic

Yew (Taxus spp.)
ID: A woody evergreen shrub with closely spaced, flat, needlelike leaves a half-inch to one inch long. Berries are bright red or yellow, soft and juicy with a hole in the end, where the dark seed is visible.
Range: Western yew and American yew are native to the West Coast and to the Eastern and central United States, respectively, but these two species along with the Japanese and English yews are commonly planted as ornamentals nationwide.
The danger: All parts of the yew plant, except for the fleshy portion of the berries, contain taxine, an alkaloid that causes respiratory and cardiac collapse. The leaves remain toxic even after dried. A single mouthful can be deadly to a horse within minutes.
Signs: Sudden death is the most typical sign of yew ingestion. Animals found alive may be trembling and colicky, with difficulty breathing and a slowed heart rate.
What to do: There is no treatment for yew poisoning. Avoidance is critical; most yew poisonings occur when trimmings are thrown into a pasture after a pruning.

EQUUS thanks Anthony Knight, BVSc, MRCVS, and Jill Richardson, DVM, for their assistance in the preparation of this article. For more information, visit Knight's website, Guide to Poisonous Plants.

This article originally appeared in the June 2004 issue of EQUUS magazine.

I read they they can kill large animals like cows by eating just a little bit. It attacks the nerious system and is very deadly.

Ironically you hear about dear eating them without effect and about 90% of people have some form as a foundation shrub.

[kristink]

Sol likes to help when I cut back shrubs by staying nearby chewing on a twig from one of the branches I've cut off– nice, but a slow method of disposal....

[wizard]

Thanks for the reminder about poisonous plants - I was recently thinking about adding yew to the back corner and I knew about that toxin too - this forum is really a good thing!

[Barklessdog]

Yews (Taxis) are high nurologically toxic, where as Hemlocks - (tsuga) confers are not

[wizard]

I was talking to my vet friend and here's a couple of other plants/plant products that can be hazardous to dogs … grapes can contribute to renal failure; onions (including the greens) can cause cumulative damage to hemoglobin; and caffeine increases heart rate (just like in us) but can cause seizures in some dogs. Just FYI