Halloween Pet Safety Tips

An emergency trip to the vet can make Halloween a real nightmare for you and your rabbit or other animal companion. We want your holiday to be fun for you and to make sure all your companion animals will be safe and happy too. Read more to find out how to prevent illness, accidents and to keep your pet safe.

• Opening your door on Halloween and how this affects your pet

  Your rabbit and other pets may not think scary people making loud noise at the door is a good thing. They may become frightened and run for cover! Birds may become alarmed and fly out the door; Rabbits may also run outside as you open your door to hand out candy. Dogs may feel threatened and may even bite. Please be safe. Keep rabbits and other pets safe from this influx of activity they will not enjoy. If you wish to celebrate with giving out candy at your door, then keep your bunny and other pets in a secure room away from the door during trick-or-treating hours!

• Be aware of Jack O'Lanterns and Candles and holiday decor

  Flames can burn your curious pet or containers could be knocked over, starting a fire or injuring the pet. Rabbits are fascinated by light sources and may hurt themselves. Birds are especially endangered by open flame and Jack O'Lanterns that they can fly into. The fumes from candles are also harmful to your bird. Many rabbits, Chinchillas and other animals do love pumpkin, so please leave jack O' lanterns outside - And after you have used it for the holiday… carved it and placed a candle inside, you cannot use in the next day for food.

• Watch out for Electrical Cords and decorations

  Those cords snaking all over the place to power all those special effects can be tempting to chew. Keep them out of pets' reach! As always, protect your rabbit and all pets from electrical cords to avoid shock, plastic ingestion and fire hazards. Artificial spider webs also need to be far out of the reach of your animals -Many animals may become entangled in them or even eat them, causing intestinal problems or worse.

• Halloween Candy, Wraps and plastic bags

  Those shiny wraps or plastic bags for Halloween candy can cause serious intestinal problems, and are particularly dangerous to birds and rabbits who may be attracted to them. Keep your bunny away from the candy bowl and the Halloween treat bags. Make sure your children enjoying Halloween candy properly dispose of wrappers so your animals will not get sick from ingesting either left over candy or plastic or foil wrappers. Note: Make sure your child's treat bag is out of your pets' reach!

• Costumes

  If you must dress up your rabbit or other animal please be careful with the costume and watch to make sure your pets is comfortable and able to move freely. We do not recommend this for rabbits, birds, rats or chinchillas. At least please do not let them wear a costume unsupervised. Chances are they are not thrilled with the outfit anyway. Your pet can become scared by the inability to move normally and knock things over trying to remove it. They can get tangled in it, caught on something or actually chew and eat parts of the costume which can cause GI issues and in some cases choking. They can injure themselves. (Hate to spoil your fun) but no costume is best.

Finally a word on a serious problem that occurs during Halloween. Sadly a few people pose the most frightening threat of all during this holiday. The week before Halloween, they steal, buy cheap or find free rabbits and other animals so they can use them in pranks, as decoration, or to use in pretend or real rituals in which the animals are harmed. Many of these animals are injured, terrified and too many are lost forever. Please take special precautions to safeguard your pet from thieves and criminals - Keep your animals inside. Also, now is most definitely not the time to rehome a black animal. Also, protect your animal friend. Keep them safe indoors. Do not let your pets roam free such as indoor - outdoor cats and dogs and backyard bunnies.

I think this list gives you are good idea of what to watch for and I bet you will think of even more ways to help keep your sweet ones safe.