Deadly Toy Could Kill Your Dog
This post may contain affiliate links. We may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this post.
While browsing my RSS feed I came across this incredibly sad story of a dog who had part of his tongue amputed because of a poorly designed toy. It’s the kind of toy I could picture myself brining home from the store. After reading the sad post I wanted to add a short post here so everyone could see this toy. If you own the pimple ball with bell toy please take it away from your dog and if you see it at the store please ask the manager to remove it from their shelves.
Pimple Ball With Bell
The toy is the pimple ball with bell produced by Four Paws Inc. Here are a couple of images of the toy:
The image of the red ball is the ball after it was cut off the dogs tongue. The image of the blue ball is the ball in it’s original packaging.
Check out the full Chai Story on blogger.
A Deadly Toy
If you continue reading through the Chai Story website Chai’s owner has posted information from another owner who’s dog died from this toy. Here’s the link to the story: Toy Kills Dog. I’m not sure if it’s true, but I have heard that if a dog loses a certain percentage of their tongue then they have to be euthanized. I’ve read similar articles of tongues being lost in shredder accidents. Here’s a short clip of information on how important a dogs tongue is:
The dog’s tongue is one of the most important parts of its body. Besides lapping up food and water, or kissing its owner, the tongue serves as an essential heat regulator. When dogs exercise, their tongues becomes larger and due to increased blood flow usually hang out of the mouth. Thus, when a dog pants, it’s actually cooling the dog’s entire body. The dog’s quick shallow breaths cause moisture on the tongue to evaporate thus cooling the tongue that in turn cools the blood flow through the tongue and the respiratory system. Providing your dog with cool air on hot or humid days is very important for temperature regulation. This is why it is so dangerous to leave a dog in an unventilated heated car. The warm air keeps the tongue from doing its job.
Sad Stories
Sorry for the sad stories at the beginning of labor day weekend. I just wanted to get this information out to try and prevent any other accidents with this ball. Oh and by the way, keep in mind that your paper shredder can be a danger to your dog as well.
Have a great labor day!
Top Picks For Our Puppies
- BEST PUPPY TOY
We Like: Calmeroos Puppy Toy w/ Heartbeat and Heat Packs - Perfect for new puppies. Helps ease anxiety in their new home. - BEST DOG CHEW
We Like: Mighty Paw Naturals Bully Sticks - All of our puppies love to bite, nip, and chew. We love using Bully Sticks to help divert these unwanted behaviors. - BEST DOG TREATS
We Like: Crazy Dog Train-Me Treats - We use these as our high-value treats for our guide dog puppies. - BEST FRESH DOG FOOD
We Like: The Farmer's Dog - A couple months ago we started feeding Raven fresh dog food and she loves it! Get 50% off your first order of The Farmer's Dog.
Check out more of our favorites on our New Puppy Checklist.
Without being to graphic, can you please tell me how the ball cut off the dog’s tongue? The links wouldn’t work for me. Are kongs okay? My golden loves them. What about treat balls!?
@Marlene from what I recall the design of the ball was flawed. I believe only having a single hole in the ball created a suction that trapped the dogs tongue in the ball which required surgery to remove part of the dogs tongue. As far as I know Kong’s are okay. I’m not sure about treat balls.
Hi! When this website first opened, and I saw the picture of this particular ball, my heart jumped. That same night our family dog Ringo was in critical condition and losing his life because of a similar looking pimple ball. Unfortunately he didnt make it ,and we had to make that devistating decision of putting him to sleep. Today we are gathering as much information as possible to enlighten peoples minds about which toys they should by their pets. Most these toys we are buying can contain toxic chemicals that could lead to the same fatal result our dog Ringo had to go through. Please do research on anything you do or buy for your pets…… Its really sad because these toys cost less than 10 dollars, and could cost the life of your dog. Goodluck to all, and please take care…
@Vincent, I’m so sorry to hear about your dog Ringo. Thank you for sharing your story and I totally agree that you should do your research before buying any toy or dog product for your dog. As you said dog toys usually cost less than 10 dollars and could cost the life of your dog.
WARNING: CUZ almost killed my great dane puppy. Please check out the following site:
http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/pimpleball.asp
On November 22, 2010, Bella, my almost 8 months puppy broke the squeaker of her new toy large Good Cuz and thus a hole was created. This hole turned out to be a powerful vacum and sucked up Bella’s tongue into the small hole. What the Cuz did to my Bella was exactly the same as the Pimple Ball did to Chai. Fortunately, Bella’s tongue is saved but poor Chai’s has been amputated. This whole incident was so distressful which I would not like to repeat it. I have already report the incident to the JW Pet company to request a recall of this dangerous toy from the market. IF THERE IS ALREADY A HOLE IN YOUR CUZ, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE THROW IT ALWAY IMMEDIATELY.
@June, thanks for letting our readers know about this dangerous toy. Hopefully there is a recall and no other dogs are injured.
No problem. Ultimately the safest thing is unplugging or keeping it out of the areas where pets and children play, but sometimes that’s unrealistic. I do know one company that specializes is keeping safety at the forefront and that is Fellowes, you can check out their SafetySense feature at http://www.fellowes.com/Fellowes/site/safesense/default.aspx (Only posting it becasue you said you wanted to keep your eye out for such features.)
Take care.
@Thom, thanks for listing the great tips on the dangers of shredders. I always tell family and friends to keep them unplugged. I didn’t know they had shredders that include the safety feature that turns the shredder off when a hand, finger, or paw get to close. I’ll have to keep my eye out for that product and trade in my old shredder.
Those are some great tidbits from the full articles. It is great that people bring the attention to dangers in the home for our pets, but the same thing applies to our children. Shredders can be dangerous to everyone, that is why they should always unplug the shredder when they are not using it, and put it away from place children or pets have access to. That simple step alone could have prevented most of the dogs’ stories, I have read about today. You can also get shredders with safety features that will turn off the shredder when a hand, finger or paw gets close to it.
@Doggerblogger, thanks…I came across the article while surfing my RSS feed. If I had this toy I’d want to know it could be dangerous for my dog and therefore I thought anyone reading my blog should know as well.
Your post was is very informative, I think you are doing a very nice thing by bringing about awareness as to how toys can harm our pets.good wo