Toxic flowers to avoid this Valentine’s Day
Giving a beautiful bouquet of flowers for your special someone on Valentine’s Day? Keep the holiday happy and safe by ensuring that none of the blooms in the bouquet are toxic to your pets!
Simply placing the vase where you think it’s out of reach can still pose a danger—falling leaves, petals and even the pollen that falls from the flowers can be toxic. Agile cats may even try to sneak a sip of vase water, and depending on the flowers, the water can be toxic too. Your best bet is to inspect the bouquet and remove any toxic flowers before your pet has the chance to “stop and smell the flowers!”.
Toxic Plants
Toxic flowers to look out for that are commonly used in bouquets include:
Lilies (Lilium and Hemerocallis species), including easter lilies, tiger lilies, daylilies, Asiatic lilies and Japanese show lilies are extremely toxic to cats. It only takes a small nibble of a leaf, petals or pollen, or a sip of vase water to cause kidney failure and death.
Non-Toxic Plants
Luckily, lots of other stunning flowers—including roses—are non-toxic and will impress the love of your life while keeping your pets healthy and safe! Choose from the following safe list of cut flowers:
When in doubt, check out the ASPCA’s Toxic and Non-Toxic Plants List to see if the flowers in your bouquet are pet-safe! If your pet has eaten a plant, don’t panic. If possible, figure out the type and amount of it your pet ate, then contact your veterinarian or the ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center at 888-426-4435 right away.
Stay connected this Valentine’s Day with free Live Chat* on the myVCA app, where our licensed veterinary professionals are always ready to answer your questions anytime, day or night.
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*Live Chat with a licensed veterinary professional is free for VCA clients through the myVCA mobile app, available at Apple’s App Store and Google Play.
