6-Pound Puppy Dies After Eating 46 Short Rib Bones

A six-pound puppy met a tragic end after somehow finding its owner’s barbecue leftovers and eating nearly 50 short ribs.

The incident took place in Sacramento, California, where animal welfare officials said the very sick puppy was brought to a shelter. As Fox News reported, the “sweet scruffy puppy” was dropped off at the Sacramento Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals shelter, where the owner was either unwilling or unable to pay for the treatment needed.

Veterinarians at the shelter determined that the dog had ingested something very large and hard. After performing emergency surgery, they found that it was short ribs — 46 of them, to be exact. It was not clear exactly how the dog was able to find and eat so many. Its owner had brought the dog to a private veterinary clinic saying that the pup was acting lethargic, but after he surrendered the dog there was no more information on what happened to it, KXTV reported.

The doctor who performed the emergency surgery said the medical staff all gave their best guesses at how many ribs were inside the tiny dog, but none of them even came close to the real total.

“The highest guess was 22, and it turned out to be 46 — and we’re going, ‘How does a little six-pound puppy eat 46 of these?'” said vet Laurie Siperstein-Cook.

The report noted that the dog originally made it through the surgery and was recovering, but the SPCA posted a note on its Facebook page that it took a serious turn over the weekend and ended up dying. The note said that the veterinary team tried their best to treat the recovering puppy, but that “unfortunately his little body could not quite catch up.”

"And we’re going, ‘How does a little six-pound puppy eat 46 of these?’” https://t.co/MT9UnElut4

— The Sacramento Bee (@sacbee_news) March 4, 2019

This is not the first story of a puppy eating a bizarre meal to make national news. Back in 2013, a dog in Montana ate $500 worth of cash that its owner had left within biting range of his dog. As the Independent Record reported, the dog had a reputation for eating anything it could get its mouth around, and its owner later said he felt stupid for leaving the five $100 bills laying out in the open.

But the owner didn’t just want to eat the losses, and said he planned to follow the dog around for the following few days and “collect” as much of the bill remains as he could, then see if the federal government would issue him new bills.