His owner had to take him to the vet's office after he ate
23 live rounds of .308 caliber ammunition.
He had chewed them vigorously to the point of mangling
the ammo, then swallowing each round. Benno eating something inappropriate is
not unusual, according to his owner Larry "Sonny" Brassfield.
"You can baby-proof a house," Brassfield said,
petting the happy, hyper dog.
"But I don't think it's possible to Benno-proof a
house. Lord knows, we've tried and failed."
The proof of Brassfield's house not being Benno-proof
came on the morning of April 22.
The night before, Brassfield was putting several hundreds
of ammo into ammo cans. He did not have enough room for the last 200 or so
rounds of ammo, so he left them in a bag by the bed.
"Wednesday morning I woke up early, and my wife told
me that Benno had thrown up," Brassfield said. "She said there was
ammo in the vomit. I looked at the round and I thought, 'Oh my God, he got into
the ammo.'"
Brassfield had no idea exactly how much ammo he had
eaten, but was about to find out.
"We decided to watch him for a while," said
Brassfield. "He ate like he normally does, no problem. Then about 15-20
minutes later, he threw up again and three more rounds came out. At that point,
I knew I had to take him to the vet."
"We took him to the vet's, they took X-rays and
counted 15 rounds. By the outlines, I counted at least 17 rounds.” Said, Brassfield.
"This is something they certainly did not cover in
school. I've had dogs eat things before, mostly stuffed toys. Once I had one
swallow a hearing aid but I think this takes the cake." said Dr. Sexton.
The vet asked was the ammo was made of lead and zinc, the
two metals used in ammo manufacturing, can quickly be toxic for dogs.
Brassfield told the vet, the ammo was made from brass and copper.
The vet operated on Benno and the procedure lasted
approximately two hours. She removed 16 live, highly chewed rounds and one
shell from the dog's stomach.
"It was an adventure. If you think of the stomach as
a balloon, where I made my incision, all the heavy metal went to the
bottom," said the vet. "I had to scoop it all up and bring it up to
the location of my incision."
Once she removed the ammo from the dog, the vet had him
X-rayed again, just to be sure she got all the ammo. Two X-rays were needed to
cover the digestive track of the large dog. That's when the vet saw two more
rounds in the dog's esophagus.
The vet made the decision not to open Benno up again to
remove the last two rounds. The surgery itself went fine and Benno is expected
to make a full recovery.
The vet said, "Since the ammo is not toxic, I
decided not to go back in. I decided we'd give it a week to see if he would
vomit them up or pass them."
Five days later, Benno passed one round, and eight days
later he passed the final round.
"I won't be leaving ammunition laying around
anymore, I can tell you that," Brassfield said. "But really, you're
never going to stop him. It's just a question of what he's going to eat
next."
Here is a list of items Benno has eaten, much to the
exasperation and displeasure of his human friends:
Stuffed animals
Rubber Toys
Coins
8-by-8-inch square pieces of cloth
Styrofoam peanuts
Cheese wrappers
Rocks
Paper
Wax paper
Aluminum foil
Shirts
Socks
Underwear
Bra
Tennis shoes
Rope
Nylon straps
Weed eater string
Gasoline-soaked lawn mower air filter
Blankets
Marbles
Plastic bag
Quilt batting
Sewing straight pins
Plastic soda bottle
Magnets
Bottle lids swallowed whole
Television remote
Loaf of bread (wrapper included)
Broken glass
Chicken legs (swallowed whole)
Nylon hairbrush
LEGOs
Travel size bottle of lotion
Baseboards
