# Will Chicken Bones Hurt My Dog? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 25, 2000, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736 "2000-07-25T04:31:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/21 "2011-07-04T10:30:20Z")
Will Chicken Bones Hurt My Zombie? What about when the bones are over a decade old? ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/22 "2011-07-04T10:38:03Z")
That’s why general advice is just don’t do it. Rather than going through a list of whether the bones are this or that, just don’t, and that’s safe. Does does it matter if the bones are 11 years old? It’s always a newbie who digs up these ancient threads. ---
**Author:** ![thelabdude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@thelabdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelabdude)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/23 "2011-07-04T12:48:14Z")
The FDA advises not giving dogs any bones, [http://www.fda.gov/AnimalVeterinary/ResourcesforYou/AnimalHealthLiteracy/ucm204796.htm](http://www.fda.gov/AnimalVeterinary/ResourcesforYou/AnimalHealthLiteracy/ucm204796.htm) Yes there are many cases of dogs eating both cooked and raw chicken bones without problems. That problems aren’t frequent, doesn’t make it a safe practice. Have you ever survived running a red light? Do you think it is a good practice? All our bones will continue going in the garbage and we will try to be careful to keep the door to it closed. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/24 "2011-07-04T12:57:12Z")
> [@thelabdude](#): > > The FDA advises not giving dogs any bones, No, it doesn’t. It talks about “what to do with the bones from the ham and roast”. Then says that “you should think twice before giving your dog any bones”. Then it gives a list of potential complications from doing that. Then it says you should “talk with your veterinarian first before you give bones to your dog.”. At no point does it say that you should not give dogs any bones. ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/25 "2011-07-04T13:23:23Z")
When I ran a pet store I always advised my customers that bones should be selected upon the basis of your individual dog. If you have an animal that gulps everything without stopping to chew or worry at their food, (labradors are notorious examples), then you probably should avoid all bones that could lodge somewhere and stick with the large ones. If your dog is like most dogs and chews their food, then you should be fine. Our dogs demolish bones with that horrible grinding, cracking noise and pick the marrow before breaking them into smaller pieces for final consumption. Never had an issue with any of them. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/26 "2011-07-05T00:15:55Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I had a dog that swallowed a chicken leg whole once. Since he swallowed it whole, it didn’t splinter (but it probably did hurt, later on… _wince_) However, bird bones do splinter fairly easily, so it probably isn’t the best thing to gnaw on. > Sure, they’re carnivores, but how easy is it to hunt birds, without shooting them? I don’t think I’ve ever head of a dog killing a bird that could fly easily, and the ones that can’t fly easily either have stronger bones (ostriches etc.) or are only common near humans (chickens etc.), so selection pressure wouldn’t be so great. My next-door neighbor’s killed and ate two crows. They mobbed him for some reason and jumped up and grabbed one, then another and ate them both. They stopped bothering him after that. In fact, we had no crows for the rest of that summer. But they’re back now, several years later. I really don’t see why cooking the chicken makes the bones more dangerous. I take it is an old wives’ tale. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/27 "2011-07-05T00:58:04Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > My next-door neighbor’s killed and ate two crows. Your neighbours must have been really hungry. > [@](#): > > I really don’t see why cooking the chicken makes the bones more dangerous. I take it is an old wives’ tale. No, it’s perfectly true. Bone is basically a crystal matrix built over a protein scaffold. The protein provides the flexibility and shape, and the crystal provides the rigidity. If your remove or denature the protein, as in cooking, the bone loses all flexibility. It becomes like glass. Instead of of breaking into little chunks, it splinters into long shards with sharp points. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/28 "2011-07-05T01:29:09Z")
For what it’s worth, my dog found and attempted to eat a chicken bone, probably cooked and pulled from the trash. I figured it out a couple of days later, when I found it, still in his mouth jammed across his palate, wedged in from one side to the other between his upper teeth. I pulled it out and took him and his paired dental abscesses to the vet. It was a couple of hundred dollars after two vet visits and antibiotics. So. No chicken bones is my vote. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/29 "2011-07-05T16:00:54Z")
Raw bones are fine. Cooked are not. They are brittle due to being heated, and can splinter and flake into sharp pieces, causing mouth and internal injuries. My dogs and cats have been eating raw bones (crunching them up and swallowing) several times per day for 6 years, and have never had a single issue. My best friend is a vet tech (who also feeds her dog raw bones daily), and she frequently gets patients with injuries/issues from eating cooked bones. It’s most definitely not a myth. Cooked bones are dangerous. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/30 "2011-07-05T16:33:47Z")
> [@PrayForWales](#): > > 1. another dog I once had ate a audio cassette tape of my music, master copy, then when defecating managed to get tied by her bum to an apple tree by trying to scratch the itching presumably, and the vet had to be called to sedate her and finger the lost songs out of her bumhole Oh my, I hope you stick around, I am still giggling. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/31 "2011-07-05T18:39:07Z")
I’ve always been kinda mehh on the dog/bones thing. Generally didnt give them to the dogs but on the flip side didn’t equate it with likely death either. Recently was eating and decided to give the dog a bone. Said to myself "if it looks like he is chewing it up well I’ll let him eat it, if not I’ll take it away. Well, right of the bat the dog bites it in half and swallows whole a big chunk. I immediately take away the rest. No big deal I think. Two or three days later the dog is feeling REALLY bad and behaving in a way I’ve never seen before. And some of the symptoms seemed to my simple mind to be consistent with a bone lodged somewhere way down there. Pretty soon I felt really fracking bad. I’ve killed my damn dog (and for what, so he could enjoy a bone when there is plenty of other shit for him to enjoy just as well thats perfectly safe?). Made an emergency visit to the vet while out of town on a Sunday. He decided it wasnt a bone thing but something else. A week and a half have now gone by and all seems well so either the bone has passed or it never was a bone (I don’t see how it could be lodged for nearly 2 weeks and not be causing problems now). That little episode convinced me the rewards were not worth the risk. ---
**Author:** ![thelabdude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@thelabdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelabdude)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/32 "2011-07-05T18:55:49Z")
Bones may or may not kill a dog, but my last Lab lived to be 15 without ever having a real bone in her life. Her teeth were in great shape, still showing the 3 lobes on the front incisors. Not feeding bones doesn’t hurt. ---
**Author:** ![Foxy40](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Foxy40](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foxy40)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2011, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736/33 "2011-07-05T19:07:14Z")
> [@thelabdude](#): > > Bones may or may not kill a dog, but my last Lab lived to be 15 without ever having a real bone in her life. Her teeth were in great shape, still showing the 3 lobes on the front incisors. Not feeding bones doesn’t hurt. Funny you should say that. My vet asked what I do to keep my dogs teeth in such great shape and I told him I give them beef rib bones. He said “that will do it” I don’t cook the bones for hours but put them in boiling water just long enough that they aren’t dripping gunk all over my house as they drag them about. So essentially they are “raw”. However, my dogs are ankle biters and a rib bone is a major undertaking for them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-chicken-bones-hurt-my-dog/26736.md?page=1)