Christmas day pet safety

December 24, 7:32 AMDC Pet Care ExaminerErin Paquette

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You know the familiar scene: family gathered around the tree, tearing open presents, exchanging more expressions of gratitude and hugs in one hour than the previous 364 days combined. But while you and your family are busy exchanging holiday wishes and exclaiming excitedly over presents, what are your pets doing?

If you don’t know, that could be a problem.

While there are some pets that are scared by all of the noise generated by Christmas excitement and will stay far away until the noise and excitement dies down, most pets will want to be there with you and your family on Christmas, sharing in your joy and investigating all of the new things that have come into the house.

It’s the “investigate” part that can cause problems.

While it’s perfectly natural for your pets to be curious, that curiosity needs to be closely monitored by you and the rest of your family. While you may not single-handedly be able to keep an eye on your pets during every minute of Christmas morning, chances are that with the help of your family members your pets can be monitored round the clock.

While it might seem tedious, keeping a watchful eye on your pets will keep them from:

• Ingesting wrapping paper, ornaments, or pieces of the tree (real or artificial)
• Being electrocuted from electronic toys or Christmas lights
• Getting hurt in the kitchen when dinner is being cooked
• Escaping outside (in the event that friends and family will be in and out of the house all day)
• Getting too wild or rough with guests or younger members of the family
• Breaking ornaments and getting glass or metal stuck in their paws, mouth, or skin
• Urinating in the house due to overexcitement

If you’re ever in doubt about who is watching your pets at any given moment in time, ask, or assign someone to watch your pets for the next 15 minutes, or until you are able to watch them again. If they get tired or are unable to watch the pets at that particular moment, they can then assign someone else to watch the pets, therefore making sure that no one person is getting burnt out, but that they pets are still being monitored on a consistent basis.

Do you have any good tips on keeping pets safe this Christmas day? If so, we’d love for you to leave a comment below.

Picture courtesy of calgrin on Morguefile.com