If you Google “dog frozen peas” – as I did moments before our latest emergency trip to the vet – you’ll find a number of articles telling you that peas, whether frozen or fresh, are a harmless and even beneficial human food that you can share with your dog. Those articles don’t go really go into specifics about how many peas are OK, but I’m guessing that a cup or small bowlful of peas would fine. I’m also guessing that consuming nearly one tenth of the dog’s body weight in peas in one sitting would be a “no-no”. Nevertheless that’s exactly what Beanie did.

I’d just brought Beanie & Biggles back from our run on the beach. They’d done nearly 10km with me, plus a short and fun-filled off-lead sprint on their own, and boy were they ready for their breakfast! Still soaked in sweat, I put the usual amount of Burns Alert into their bowls, then added a bit more because they’d earned it. As routine demands, as soon as I exited the kitchen Biggles woofed and boinged up so high that his nose touched mine, while Beanie ran to her customary position in the hall and plonked her bum firmly on the floor to wait. I served up their nosh, made them wait briefly, then said “OK, take it!” and the feeding frenzy began. About this time Susan called me over to her office to look at a training video on YouTube, so I left the two Beaglets to munch their way through the food.

About three minutes later the YouTube video ended and in the silence I became aware that some kind of munching was still in progress. It normally takes only 30 seconds for a bowlful of Burns to be emptied, so I went to investigate and found Beanie in the lounge with the remnants of a huge bag of frozen peas that Susan had been using to treat one of her training injuries. Beanie was behaving like a junkie in withdrawal; she was shaking and shivering and trying desperately to get the last few peas as I took them from her. I picked her up to warm her but her shivering grew more violent and she couldn’t settle in any position. What’s more, she was horribly bloated; her abdomen was fully twice its normal width. It looked like she’d swallowed two soccer balls whole! Susan called the vet and surprisingly enough they told us to bring her in..

I sat in the car with Biggles while Beanie waddled into the vet with Susan. They got an examination room by the window so I was able to watch some of the proceedings. I can’t lip read but from past experience and the nodding and shaking of Susan’s head I could pretty much guess the conversation.

“She ate how many peas?”

“One kilo”

“And she didn’t eat anything else that could be dangerous? Nothing jagged or sharp? And she didn’t eat the packet?”

“Nope. Just her breakfast. And the peas.”

Susan and Beanie then disappeared from view for a few minutes and I shuffled into a more comfortable position in my seat, ready for a long wait. I couldn’t help chuckling to myself when I thought of how eating all those peas had clearly distressed Beanie, yet she’d still been so keen to finish the packet. I’m the same when I have one of those thick, super-chilled milkshakes out of McDonald’s; the ice-cream headache certainly hurts, but I just have to keep chugging on that drinking straw.

About ten minutes later Susan emerged from the practice, bringing with her a slightly groggy but far, far thinner version of The Beanster. As expected the vet had induced vomiting and Beanie, though very keen to hang on to her precious cache of peas, had finally succumbed to the medication. The vet now had a plentiful supply of thawed, intact and undigested peas to supplement her lunchtime repast. And contrary to Susan’s assurances, she also had a substantial portion of the bag they’d originally been packaged in. What’s more, my wallet had lost a bit of weight too.

Despite her misadventure The Pupplet still can’t resist the lure of frozen peas

EDIT: We just received a picture taken by the vet during the pea recovery process:

This is typical Beanie; absorbent pads have been put down but our little girl is clearly doing her best to miss them and dump her peas (and earlier kibble breakfast) onto the floor. Nice!

I think that spending two whole nights in our bed during our “kennel” holiday  has gone to Beanie’s head. She’s always been a little too full of herself, but lately this has gone into overdrive and her respect for us, if she ever had any(!), has hit rock bottom.

For some reason Beanie feels she has a right to directly examine our food, even as it’s going into our mouths..

I can’t think what we could be doing to support this inflated sense of Beagle self…

But I dare say Caesar Milan would have a thing or two to say about it

Some of the things she does are downright annoying. Cups or glasses cannot be left unguarded for more than second; last Saturday as I prepared for a “parkrun” I poured myself a glass of orange juice, put it on the coffee table and walked a couple of meters away to grab my running watch from my desk. The whole thing took less than five seconds and yet in that time Beanie – who had been curled up apparently asleep – had clambered onto the table and begun merrily lapping up my pre-race drink.

Then there’s the “blankie” routine. Beanie likes to be covered when she’s napping and her signal for a blankie is a pawing motion. This is accompanied by a stare so intense & hypnotic that it’s like she’s using a Beagle version of The Force on you: “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for. Cover me with a blankie then you can go about your business”. If a blanket is not immediately forthcoming then vocal protests ensue, and these aren’t the loud woofing variety – they’re an understated whiny whimper issued at regular intervals. It’s like a dripping tap – no matter how engrossed you are in work you have to have to respond eventually. And when you do respond, she tests the quality of the covering by circling and tossing her head. If any part of her head is uncovered during this test, she dumps the blanket on the floor like a spoiled child having a tantrum, and the whole process has to begin again.

To be fair though Biggles is trying it on too; it’s just that his behavior is easier to take. Sit down with a TV dinner next to him and he’ll twist over onto his back, exposing his tummy and all his wares. The tastier the food, the more alluring will be his pose, and while he doesn’t get any food for this display, he does get cuddles which for the Bigglet is a reward in itself.

It’s pretty clear that a mild dose of “nothing in life is free” is called for, but do we have the mental fortitude to administer it?