PLANTAIN LILY AND THE SLUG BAIT EPISODE

(Once again, this was written many years ago)

This is Plantain Lily. And let me state from the beginning, I do not know who gave her the beer. I do not condone giving beer to dogs less than 3 years old (2 years in some states, 6 months in New Orleans). Obviously we call her Lily.

Lily was given to me as a birthday present in 1998, and the same day I got her, I damn near accidentally killed her. And this is the gripping story about why I hate slug poisons that contain metaldehyde.

This was written about 20 years ago, and many new "safer" solutions to the slug problem are available now, but I still recommend caution in using them. When I wrote this, the vast majority of slug baits contained metaldehyde. A number of new baits have been introduced since then, but I understand that there are still some questions about their safety or effectiveness.

On her first day with me as Lily's guardian and protector, I had to go to a friend's nursery so I took her along to show her off. And since I don't use slug bait, it didn't occur to me that this stuff would be scattered throughout the growing area - until I looked down and saw her eating something. "What's that blue stuff?" I asked. "Uh, slug bait." came the reply.

And off we went, flying down the road to the nearest vet, driving 60 miles an hour through suburban Baltimore, running red lights and terrifying pedestrians.

At the vet's office, they gave her something that made her puke her guts out. Everything came up bright blue and you could see the little pieces of bait pellets that she had eaten. They called Poison Control and the word came back that Lily had consumed a lethal dose, but the fact that we got it out so fast was encouraging and she might live. Her first night as my dog was spent at the vet's, hooked up to intravenous anti-convulsives.

The next day, the vet told us that it looked like she would be alright, that if she was going to die it usually happened within 24 hours, but that sometimes dogs appeared to recover but died 2 or 3 days later. That was sort of encouraging.