Dog's determination to eat poisonous chocolate

Now the thing is, Jane grew up on a farm in another country, where all the dogs were working dogs and lived outside. She was not used to the concept of dogs in the house and certainly not ones which had no “useful” purpose.

I had two such dogs and while it was true they were great companions, if I had set them in a field of sheep they would have probably just rolled over and gone to sleep. I don’t blame them, sheep are boring.

Jane, however, assumed non-working dogs had lost their instincts, such as scavenging, and it didn’t occur to her, upon receiving a giant Easter egg in the post, that one of my indoor dogs would demonstrate his amazing stealth and snatch prowess.

It was a big egg. A good quality egg, made with a staggeringly high cocoa content. It was the sort of egg a besotted young man might send to the object of his affection. And it survived in her zipped suitcase, on top of a chest of drawers, behind a closed door, for all of about 30 minutes.

The other problem about not having animals in your home is you never learn the potential dangers of certain human foods, such as raisins, sweeteners and chocolate. However, that doesn’t stop you exploding in incandescent rage when you see your prized love token being toted out of the doggie door.

Jane, who is a firefighter and knows no fear, was having none of this. There ensued a short scuffle. It was a well matched fight. A determined dog who had found treasure and wasn’t keen to give it up and a farmer’s daughter who was quite used to dogs bending to her will.

I should have videoed it.

Instead, I went outside and told him to “Drop it”, one of the most useful commands you can teach a dog. He did.

Amazingly, the egg was still intact within its, by now, slightly shabby box. And after Jane and Boris indulged in a snarly glare-off, the prized egg was returned to the house and a more secure spot (not the fridge, he could open that wearing a blindfold).

It was a close-run thing, because, let’s face it, no replacement I could offer was ever going to match one from her beau, but even worse, had Boris managed to consume that giant offering, weighing in at about 22kg he would only have had to gulp down 250g of bittersweet chocolate before suffering seizures. Less than double that amount could have killed him. Either way, it would have cost me a whole load of money and time at the vets.

As it was, Jane has gained a grudging respect for house dogs, a great dinner story, and to put things away safely.

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