Will dogs die if they eat chocolate? *Depends*

Doc Jones and I are back with another video.

We're tackling the popular belief: Will Dogs Really Die If They Eat Chocolate?

If your furry friend gets into your favorite chocolate chips, you might not have to worry.

It's really all about dosage. And if you have a larger dog, chances are they might have just hit their limit on chocolate...

Learn more about dogs and chocolate in this video I created for you guys   ▶️  

And ppppplllleeeasssee let me know your experience with dogs and chocolate.

My only experience with dogs eating chocolate was as a child.  My parents bought my brother and I each a box of chocolate covered cherries as one of our Christmas gifts.  A couple hours after opening presents, my brother cane out of his room screaming that I stole his cherries and ate them all.  Of course I started screaming back that I didn't touch his cherries, I had only eaten one or two of my own.  Loud yelling match in the middle of the living room.  Just as my parents were interjecting and trying to get to the bottom of things, our little schnauzer-mutt dog puked up a whole box of chocolate covered cherries.  Mystery solved.  The dog didn't die, probably because he puked, but for the next few hours, the house smelled wonderfully of chocolate covered cherries.

I had a small Australian terrier,  she weighed less than 20 pounds.   One evening she was just zooming all over the house,  very unlike her usual self.  When I went up to bed I found that she had gotten into my duffle bag and eaten about half of a large Toblerone dark chocolate bar I had bought on vacation.  The next year she became diabetic, I suspect this might have been triggered by the chocolate bar,  but no certainty.

Came back from Christmas eve dinner and the inlaws schnauzer had raided the gifts.  He probably ate over a pound of chocolate.  After much hullabaloo, he was fine.

Our collie cross got into an ice cream bucket full of semi sweet chocolate chips one time when I was a kid. He ate most of it and was fine.

My old English sheepdog ate a chocolate orange at Christmas one year and was also fine.

Both big dogs, so probably high tolerance.

I'm not sure! Unless I see dogs die Infront of me eating chocolates.

When I was a kid we had a beagle mix dog eat a huge plate of fudge at Christmas. Her stomach was really tight and she was drinking a lot of water. We rationed her water when it looked like she was going to explode if she had more. It was probably the sugars causing this. She was fine the next day. It was a bit scary for a while though. This was back in the days when taking the dog to the vet was not an option unless there was a limb hanging off. The same was true for us kids too (going to the doctor if we were sick, not going to the vet).

So..I just need to go outside for a minute..my chocolate will be fine where it is..
i just got inside and turned on some YouTube farming videos.  I set out a a few pounds of my favorite of chocolate and some grapes to snack on and realized I forgot to feed the goats...goats before YouTube..I think that was in my marriage vows somewhere!  So 10 minutes later I’m back and headed back for my recliner and there stands my Plott Hound, Lady Airwai Lineaker deYardborough licking her lips standing in the wreckage of the uneaten remains of my 2lbs of  imported $34 worth of exceptional Swiss hand made chocolates.  Panic was not my first thought but it rapidly replaced my urge to grab and load the shotgun hanging ominously over the mantle..but to my credit..that passed when I realized I had never actually bought ammunition..it was just a guy thing..🤔 ?
My dog stood there sheepishly (honestly..for a moment she actually looked like Fluffy our leader ram!) with her tail wiggling and a nervous smile covered in partially chocolate covered evidence hoping, I think, that I would be just as happy to eat the grapes (that she only licked and tested a few of) instead of noticing the obvious missing box of my favorite handmade chocolates.  As I stood there assessing what comes next Lady sat and began eyeing the grapes she left behind and watched curiously as I picked up the detritus and did a quick internet search on how much chocolate dogs can eat before their digestive track loses all sense of poise and self-control.  The answer..”None!  Chocolate in ANY amount will KILL your dog!”  So off to the local farm vet...who giggled and rewarded my dog with a digestive biscuit while asking (the dog) how her tummy felt and whether it was good chocolate!  I answered for the dog who had foregone all evidence of sheepishness and was inspecting the vets pockets for more digestives.
Turns out that chocolate only effects some dogs and most are just fine.  Evidently the nearly 1 billion people who write the anecdotal information which we find at the end of a 20 second search engine quest are largely misinformed and given to either nervous hysterics or outright lawerly prevarication and fear monging.  
The veterinarian smiled charmingly as she collect $186.12 plus 8.7% state sales tax and told me to keep an eye on her, make her comfortable and make sure she had lots of water..so I’m out my favorite chocolates, the half day it took me to go buy them, the rest of the day I spent watching my dog get pet and sweetly talked to by strangers, my FAVORITE CHOCOLATES!, and now gone was the pleasant afternoon set aside for lazy viewing of streaming videos of farm animals and blooper reels..life just isn’t fair sometimes!
Well I know you’re all wondering.>yes, Lady is just fine! I still have a hankering for fine chocolates that has so far gone I rewarded, because the veterinarian has my annual budget for dark handmade chocolates, and my hound seems even less inclined to do anything whatsoever that I dreamed my ‘next dog’ would learn and I forgot that she had licked the grapes after ‘grooming’ herself earlier in the day and I absentmindedly popped a few in my mouth before the realization reoccurred to me...I need alcohol!

So, here is the deal with chocolate...it is ALL about the TYPE of chocolate, and yes, to a certain degree it will affect others more adversely than others based on tolerance and size.

The issue is a compound call Theobromine that is contained in chocolate. Dark chocolate has SIGNIFICANTLY more than semi sweet or milk chocolate - the stuff on your commercial chocolate bar has even less...

The second big issue is size, as there is a finite line between poisoning and tolerance.

Theobromine affects the heart, lungs and nervous system, and also causes dehydration.   100mg-500mg per kg of body weight is the toxic level of Theobromine; 50mg - 225mg per pound of dog.

Ideally, if dog ingests chocolate (check with your vet) force feed salted water to induce vomiting to try to remove as much of the chocolate before it is digested. Do this in the bathtub so vomit can be flushed immediately and little clean up is required.

Commercial chocolate bar and a large dog, unlikely to be an issue; Chocolate covered cherries, unlikely to cause issue. Fancy, solid, dark chocolate such as Truffles, you are likely in the danger zone, DEPENDING on quantity eaten and size of dog. Generally a Google search will bring up a chocolate calculator that compares your dogs weight and the specific type of chocolate to determine IF levels are dangerous.

Grapes: Issue here is it is CERTAIN dogs and CERTAIN grapes - but this has not (to my knowledge) been clearly ascertained at this time.

What we do know is that SOME dogs, upon ingesting grapes or raisins suffer rapid, generally, untreatable kidney failure.

There are SIGNIFICANT variances as to tolerance - one dog is fine the other outright dies...so it is now recommended to disallow anything in the grape family (currants, raisins etc) as this issue is NOT currently well understood.