What To Do If Your Dog Eats A Lemon?

What to Do If Your Dog Eats Lemon? It is certainly not news that lemon is harmful for dogs. However, there is no need to panic yet. Let’s find out what happens if a dog eats lemon.

What To Do If Your Dog Eats A Lemon
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What Happens When A Dog Eats A Lemon?

When Dogs or any other canine eat a lemon, they stand a risk of getting poisoned. And this is because lemons contain a lot of citric acid that is not good for dogs.

Also, lemons contain essential oils and limonene (a chemical compound) that is very harmful to dogs.

In fact, most dogs have a very strong reaction to lemon, their system is always disoriented when they ingest it (notwithstanding the quantity).

What Are the Health Challenges That Dogs Are Exposed to When They Ingest Lemon?

The following are some after-effects of a dog eating a lemon:

  • Diarrhea
  • Liver failure
  • Skin irritation
  • drooling
  • Depression
  • Collapse
  • Vomitting
  • Photosensitivity
  • Tremors
  • Weakness

One of the different health challenges that a dog is likely to have after ingesting lemon is diarrhea. This is really common in dogs and it should be taken care of appropriately when noticed.

Continuous ingestion of lemon could increase a dog’s tendency of suffering failure of the liver. And the increased acid content in the body system is responsible for this.

Also, dogs that come in contact with lemon could have skin irritation. In fact, it is recommended that any dog that has come in contact with lemon juice should be kept away from direct sunlight for some 48 hours.

In addition, dogs that have ingested are exposed to having issues such as; drooling, depression, collapse, vomiting, photosensitivity, tremors, weakness and the likes.

What To Do When My Dog Eats Lemon?

Here’s a quick rundown of what to do when your dog eats a lemon:

  • Take away the lemon.
  • Clean the lemon juice off your dog.
  • Report the case to your dog.

Now to expound on those:

The first thing to do as a dog owner is to take the lemon away from your dog at the moment when you notice the development.

Doing this, you have made sure that no additional damage is done to your dog.

Do not react to this by getting afraid or uneasy. Your demeanor should be a calm one in order for you to do the right things (and actually get to help your lovely pet).

Cheshire Animal
Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

The next thing to do is to clean the lemon juice off your dog. A thorough bath might be necessary if your dog has somehow rolled around in the juice.

If, however, the contact is localized (that is just certain spots), you could get away with just bathing those spots.

Now, some people might suggest inducing vomiting. However, with something acidic like lemon, inducing vomiting isn’t the right way to go.

It is bad enough that the lemon has gone down the digestive tract. Causing it to make another journey is definitely not good news.

So, once you’ve cleaned up your dog as quickly as you can, you’ll need to report the case to the vet.

At your Veterinarian’s, they might decide to carry out gastric irrigation on your dog to get the lemon juice out of its digestive system.

Your Veterinarian could also decide to administer activated charcoal to the affected dog, this helps to stop the absorption of the ingested lemon juice into the dog’s blood stream.

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How To Avoid A Recurrence

As is with other health cases in dogs, it is better to prevent the occurrence of this than look for a way to manage it.  

One of the ways to make sure that your dog doesn’t get in harm’s way with lemon is to make sure that lemons are kept in places where your dog cannot gain access.

Another thing to do is to make sure that your dog is kept in a crate or some other containment device when you are not around to monitor them.

A dog that is kept in a safe place has a very low risk of getting close to lemon let alone ingesting it.

What To Do If Your Dog Eats A Lemon? — FAQs

Can Lemons Kill Dogs?

Lemons can deal dogs if the dogs eat the lemons. Lemons are very acidic and when you combine that with the psoralens they contain, you have a really toxic fruit for dogs.

Can My Dog Have Lemonade?

Dogs should not have lemonade considering that lemonade is basically lemons and some sugar.

Can I Put Lemon In My Dog’s Water?

Squeezing in a little bit into their drinking bowl shouldn’t be an issue if your dog is into the taste of lemon in their water, .

Yea, we know that so far, it has looked like we are totally against lemons for those and we’d actually preferring staying away from those. But even we have to admit that a little bit would be fine.

Can I Spray My Dog With Lemon Water?

If a little bit of lemon is squeezed into a bottle of water, spraying that could be a good deterrent.

Some people swear by it to be an effective detterent against chewing on furniture and even barking.

However, bear in mind that your dog could get skin irritation if a lemon directly touches their skin.

Also, if there’s a problem behaviour you’re trying to correct with your dog, please check with your vet.

Can I Let My Dog Lick A Lemon?

You shouldn’t allow your dog lick a lemon. Generally, dogs don’t even like the taste. They probably just would because you asked them to.

Having the lemon come in direct contact with your dog could lead to a number of uncomfortable skin issues.

Does Lemon Kill Fleas On Dogs?

Technically, lemon juice could work to get rid of fleas and some people even swear by it.

However, if your dog has a flea infestation, you really want to speak with your vet instead of immediately resorting to home remedies. A lot of those things are really questionable.

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