Yes you read it correctly our Golden Retriever Mica on two occasions was stoned!
A stoned dog? Well we will never know for sure if she was or not but twice during the summer last year Mica was displaying signs very similar to those you see in humans who have have had to much to drink or been on the magic mushrooms! So what was going on?
Both events began to manifest themselves sometime after we had come back from a walk.
The first time it happened we noticed Mica appeared to be sleeping for longer than usual. I went to give her a fuss and make sure she was ok when I spotted her eyes. The pupils were very dilated! She was also unnaturally sensitive to noise and her head being touched.
Being an elderly dog and as she had not displayed any abnormal behaviours or symptoms prior to this sudden change our first thoughts were has she had a stoke? She certainly didn’t show any signs of wanting to get up. Eventually we did manage to coax her to get up and though she could move she wasn’t exactly happy on her feet and really only wanted to lie back down.
Although a stroke was a possibility despite her not having the common symptoms – aside from unusual tiredness -(unable to balance, traveling in circles, funny eye movements or loss of control) we then wondered if she had eaten or drunk something toxic.
This was a very distinct possibility!
On both occasions the area they had been walked in on the day had as a result of Covid restrictions and lockdowns seen a massive increase in the numbers of people using it. Families were turning up in large numbers to let their kids play and have picnics. Groups were gathering in the early evenings and instances of drinking and drug taking increased dramatically. You could see the after effect the next day – a massive increase in the amount of rubbish including drink bottles, left over food etc. etc. in the area.
Golden Retrievers are a bit like dustbins on legs! They will eat just about anything they find that is edible and most things that aren’t! Ours are true to type and it seemed very probable that Micas condition was the result of ingesting something she shouldn’t have.
Our dogs are walked off the lead as much as possible. We constantly have to be aware of where they are and what they’re doing and intervene as soon as we spot them trying to eat something. There are however occasions when they defeat our attempts! We think this was one of those occasions!
As Mica wasn’t being sick if it was something she had eaten then it was in her system and would run its course. There was little we could do about it. We just had to hope it wasn’t going to be lethal.
We got Mica through to the living room where we could keep an eye on her through the evening then I spent the whole night with her!
It was just before dawn the following morning when Mica started to get back to normal.
I had fallen asleep on the floor beside her and was woken by her nuzzling me. She wanted to go out to the garden for a wee! After that things improved rapidly and by breakfast she was pretty much as right as rain!
The second time our Golden Retriever was stoned was virtually identical to the first by way of symptoms however if was a more short lived event with full recovery by late evening fortunately.
What Mica ingested is any body’s guess! I felt it could have been alcohol or maybe she found some discarded/lost cannabis.
Having done some research online the symptoms are far more aligned to cannabis. Maybe she came across an edible form of it!
The good news is since the two episodes there have been no reoccurrences (thank goodness!) and she has been her old self.
You might find this article from Preventivet that I found regarding dogs and cannabis interesting – Marijuana, Cannabidiol & Dogs
Our Golden Retriever got stoned? For sure there could be other explanations for what happened to Mica. If you have any thoughts or experiences of a similar nature we would love to hear from you. Either comment on this post, submit your own post of use our Contact form
