Dog-Proofing your Christmas tree during the festive season.
As the excitement of Christmas approaches and the decorations start to appear around the house, your dog is inevitably going to become very intrigued.
There is nothing nicer than spending time decorating your tree and standing back to admire what you’ve achieved. But reality soon dawns, if you have a mischievous dog or puppy! At this point, your dog will be thinking, how amazing this new ‘toy’ is and starts to have a tug!!
Christmas trees and dogs are not always the best, or safest, combination. The tree itself, as well as the surrounding Christmas decorations, can be dangerous and even deadly in some cases.
To help you enjoy the magic of Christmas, not worry about the safety of your dog and, indeed, keeping the tree looking amazing, we have set out a list of different ways of dog-proofing your Christmas tree this year:
- Decorate your Christmas tree with dog-friendly decorations. Dogs and Christmas trees don’t always mix, and the safety hazards don’t end with the tree. Plenty of festive décor can be hazardous to dogs. Avoid using anything edible, including chocolate, which is toxic to dogs, glass, bells, metal hooks, salt dough ornaments (which are poisonous to dogs) and tinsel.
- Use physical barriers.
- Use training cues to keep your dog away from the Christmas tree.
- Consider an artificial tree rather than a real tree, the smell of the real tree will enhance senses.
- Stabilize the tree using a heavy-weighted tree stand.
- Section off the space where the tree will go – never leave your dog unattended around, or in the same room, as the tree.
- Delay placing gifts around the tree. It’s more items for the dog to explore and will encourage the dog to approach the tree.
- Do not let your dog drink the water in the tree stand (if you choose to have a real tree) you can eliminate this by only having a very small amount of water in the holding cup.
Why not try and decorate the tree using decorations such as Christmas cards, or putting the most fragile and breakable ornaments on display out of your dogs reach.
Christmas lights can cause a host of issues too, including fires and strangulation, to try and avoid your dog chewing or pulling on the lights you could spray a pet deterrent on the lights before you put them on the tree to discourage chewers.
Of course, no one wants to zap the excitement and fun out of Christmas. However, take a few preventative steps to create a dog-proof Christmas tree. They might end up saving the Christmas season and stop you from being on edge every time your dog walks past the tree.
We all love the holidays, and our pets love the holidays too. Lots of excitement, new scents and things to see. Particularly, with the year we’ve all had with the pandemic, none of us want to be spending the festive season with our dogs in the veterinary centre or without our Christmas trees.
Hopefully, the helpful tips above about dog-proofing your Christmas tree will help to ensure the tree stays in one piece and you and your dogs can enjoy the Christmas period safely.
