Here in New England, fall is in full swing. Fall is one of, if not my favorite season. I love the cool, crisp days filled with bright sunshine, and the beauty of the trees as they ready themselves to shed their leaves in preparation for winter.
The problem is, once those trees drop those leaves and cover the ground, they can become pretty dangerous, especially to dogs.
Where I live, the town collects the leaves in the fall, which means people pile their leaves on the side of the street for the town to collect them. My neighborhood doesn’t have sidewalks, so we walk on the side of the road, right alongside (or in) the leaves.
Last week I watched a neighbor raking her leaves, while her small grandson buried himself in them, and it hit me, leaves can be dangerous for kids too! Hence the (and kids) in the title.
But they’re leaves, and they’re pretty, how can they be dangerous, you ask.
There’s danger in these here leaves.
Things to be aware of, when walking your dog (or kid) near leaves.
- Food – When you have a Labrador with a nose for food, you really have to be watchful around leaves. Some of the people in this neighborhood haven’t gotten the memo about not feeding bread to the birds! Last week Sampson dove into a pile of leaves and came out with a wad of bread that I had to wrestle away from him. And just yesterday, Delilah came up with a cookie. A cookie! Who the hell tosses out a cookie? One would hope that a child knows better than to dig a cookie up out of a leave pile and pop it in their mouth, BUT Halloween was on Monday night, and
clumsycold little fingers could have easily dropped a candy bar. I don’t know many dogs, or kids that can resist a candy bar. For that matter, it might be tempting to some of the adults I know.
Is that a cookie I smell?
- Curbs/Holes – Leaves can be hiding curbs or pot holes. With Sampson’s bad leg, I’m constantly worried about him stepping off a curb wrong, or twisting his leg in a hole. He’s actually fallen coming down off a curb, talk about heart stopping. The good thing is, dog’s are like that drunk at the club, who falls down and pops right back up…”I’m okay.”
- Sharp Objects – I’m not just talking sticks here either. Our recycle guy apparently isn’t all that accurate with the automatic bin lever. Many times I’ve found broken glass on the sides of the streets. Now, when I come home and find a mess in front of MY house, I clean it up. But most of my neighbors do not. No, those lazy asses leave it right where it fell. And those little pieces can easily get covered up by the leaves and an unsuspecting dog or child can wind up with glass in a paw or appendage. Take it from the woman who had to go to the podiatrist to have a piece of glass dug out of her foot. It’s no fun.
- Insects – I’m specifically talking here about fleas and ticks. Ticks feed only at certain temperatures, (they don’t care for the really hot and humid, nor do they feed in the winter.) They prefer the cooler days in spring and fall. Monday, I noticed a tiny black spot on Samspon’s head, I reached out and picked it off and it was tick. (FTR he got a nice swim in some alcohol. The tick, not Sampson!) We have our yard sprayed for fleas and ticks AND because of his bad leg, Sampson hadn’t been out back, so really the only place he could have gotten it, was on our morning walk. I’m sure there’s spiders and worms in there too! Spiders and worms and ticks, OH MY!
- Animal Eliminations – Ewww! Yeah, I know it’s gross to even think about, but it’s not just MY dogs that pee/poop in leaves. All dogs like to check their pee-mail and leave a reply. And, other animals can eliminate there as well. There are number of diseases that can be transmitted by rodent droppings and Leptospirosis is on the rise in the wildlife population. Those to me are good reasons to keep my dogs out of the leaves.
Peed on ’em, now I just gotta walk away.
- Animals – While it’s not likely that a fox or bear is going to jump out of the leaves at you, smaller animals, such as mice and chipmunks can certainly be hiding or nesting there. Especially the chipmunks in our neighborhood; I swear those little bastards get their jollies out of antagonizing my dogs. Ever get your arm dislocated because your dog saw a mouse or chipmunk? Yeah, it’s no fun. Now, imagine being dragged down the street through a pile of leaves filled with food, glass, bugs, animals and poop.
Talk about a bad day.
Leaves can also be slippery both when they are dry AND wet, as a rule of thumb, I try to avoid them as much as possible. How about you? Do you let your dogs/kids play in the leaves, or are you like me, and try to avoid them?
Don’t forget the snakes could hide in there! We sometimes make a pile to pose in, but normally, we don’t play in leaf piles and we don’t have enough in our yard to do much with.
I love it Jodi!!! Especially the “peeing on it and walking away part”! Sharing…Have a great week!
We’ve had such a dry summer that we’re a bit leery of mulching the leaves yet. But our neighbor is going to do that job for us when he does his own. Down here the leaves aren’t picked up unless they’re bagged and left out for the garbage men. There are some leaves though that I need to get rid of at some point. And yes, wet leaves – even dry ones – can be treacherous!
There was a sad incident here a while back where two little girls were hiding in a pile of leaves and got run over by the father of one of them, We haven’t looked at leaves the same since then.
That’s so terrible!
It’s difficult to find a decent leaf pile around here, since the lawn guys take their job so seriously. If we do see anything that looks like fun, Mom says the word, “leave it” and that’s the end of the fun…..
Story of my life,
Cupcake
I never even thought of some of these things! When I was a child, I put my hands down into piles of leaves on the side of the road. Well, it turns out the neighbor had been burning these leaves and my hands got burned. I was pretty young, and I can still remember how painful it was.
Needless to say, I’m in the avoidance category, though I’m not sure if people really burn leaves any more?
I never would’ve thought of these … it seems so harmless to play in the leaves … but you are absolutely right!
Snakes and black widows are the dangers in leaves here!
Man you sure know how to put a buzzkill on beautiful leaves, don’t cha, Jodi? All kidding aside, I think this is a timely and prudent post. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve found dog poop brilliantly disguised in leafs. Just disgusting! Happy weekend, I’m praying the wind takes most of my leaves next door or better yet, over to the next block over. 😇
Not a fan of slippery leaves. Ours have just started to fall which seems late to me.
I stepped in poop that had been covered by leaves TWICE last week. And Barley stepped in a drain that was covered in leaves (but she also just kept trotting along no problem after a quick little surprise).
We have so many cats in the neighborhood and ALL of them hide their cat poop in the leaves and it’s a feeding frenzy with the dogs lately – I have to walk down the middle of the street!
The ticks are out in full force right now…seriously, its like an epidemic! I took Scarlett and Ryder out for a walk the other day, and there were tucks crawling all over them!
I am with you on this. Those fallen leaves are pretty to look at but what’s underneath it just is unpredictable. Better be careful than sorry.
Wow. I never realized how dangerous piles of leaves can be!