I didn’t know where to put this post as we have no category for pets and fruit. I learned a great trick this fall that I just made up. If your dog (don’t know about cats) needs to take a pill or half a pill, I place the pill inside of a raspberry and it is gobbled in a second. Hmm. I thought… raspberry season is almost over, I better try store bought raspberries for backup. The first two ‘Dricoll’s’ raspberries she spit out, as they were too large and had no flavor. I tore the raspberry into two parts and then she finally smelled raspberry. Wow, I have a gourmet dog; she loves my Kiwi Gold raspberries! I went out and picked raspberries today to freeze, should she need pills again during the winter. A small pill or half of one fits nicely inside of a raspberry. Mrs. G
dogs are quite amazing for not being obligate carnivores, and have had several that, if given the chance, will gorge themselves with bananas, berries(like yours), and even rice,beans, mango, etc.
cats, for some reason, seem to be limited to meat/fish/milk/occasional pigeon and not much else
I’ve never been able to fake out a cat with pills. The direct force method is required
Berries, apples, peaches, sweet peppers, cucumbers, melons, watermelons, green beans, overripe green beans(to the point the seeds get white), tomatoes, carrots, parsley - greens and roots, cabbage… You name it - Bassy will eat it with great enthusiasm. Not will just try it - will eat as much as you give her and ask for more. She is 10 month old now 
(She also attempted to eat raw potatoes and eggplants, but was restricted in doing so - I am afraid for her stomach 
)
Her sister Maya will eat some of it, but in small amounts and slow. Her stomach is not that good for veggies too, so now when Bassy gets exciting red or yellow pepper, Maya gets a boring piece of home made Beef Jerky. Poor Maya! 
I’ve seen my cat eat my cantaloupes out of the garden. It was bad enough one year I kept that cat up for cantaloupe season.
I’ve had a couple dogs that like to eat watermelon rinds.
I have had dogs my whole life, maybe 15 of them or so, not one ever ate fruit, still don’t. And remember some dogs that eat grapes will experience kidney failure and even sudden death.
Dogs produce their own vitamin C and do not need fruit, ever, I tend to avoid dog products with fruit myself. It is not natural for them to eat fruit.
Actually wolfs eat wild fruit and berries and even some roots.
Yes, you’re correct, good to know! Just keep those grapes away! I use homemade syrup on ice cream, and my dog loves ice cream, so consumes some fruit from the syrup. But it’s all about the ice cream. As far as i know they do not consume ice cream in the wild 
Yet he makes me give him some with those looks! Besides the ice cream though none of my other dogs would eat fruit or veggies, unless meat gravy or juice is on them and such.
Not sure about the “not natural” part of your statement. So cal has coyotes everywhere. Their scat is filled with seeds and yes lots of fur. My dog would pluck avocados right of the tree and got really fat consuming dropped apricots. Given the choice a dog will eat meat first but they are opportunists – given the opportunity of food they will eat it. Cats are a different story they are obligate carnivores.
Ice cream is worse for dogs than raspberries.
Yes, and it looks like raspberries are perfectly fine. I’m no longer going to avoid fruit products for dogs, as it appears it is something they do eat in the wild. I should have done more research, i was wrong. So I learned something! The last syrup I made was raspberry so he got both. He loves it so much, I can’t refuse him. he is so obedient too. Best dog i ever had. So a treat now and then is in order.
When i asked my Vet about what dogs cannot have he said grapes and chocolate. Chocolate is not life threatening like grapes. I said to the Vet, “it is said onions and garlic are bad for them too” He said well, I have had dogs in here for grapes and chocolate, but nobody ever brought me a dog sick from garlic or onions.
Speaking of syrup I took some black currants, a few black and red raspberries , and some Black Velvet gooseberries, and made a syrup. My wife said it was the best syrup I ever made. The gooseberries mellowed out the currants, a great way to introduce people to black currants.
The musk flavor has rough edges, the gooseberries and a few raspberries rounded the corners. A very nice, and unique flavor. I made jam with this combo and one friend said I should be marketing this jam! Best he ever had.
Many times we have small amounts of fruit and I have become a master blender trying to figure out how to have enough fruit to use them for processing. I need to write some of these blends down as i forget sometimes what i used!
Chocolate can definitely be life threatening to dogs, depends on the type of chocolate, size of dog and how much gets eaten. You are right about onions and garlic too. The aspca has a great list,
there’s this feral cat that keeps digging up my compost pit to pull out jackfruit rags to eat. Not sure why, but all other cats don’t care for it.
I had a dog that loved figs. He would follow me around when I was picking and beg for figs. Thie tree’s branches reached the ground but he would never “pick his own”.
Maybe there’s something to it. I have a friend that makes barbecue and fajitas out of jackfruit.
Katy
An obligate carnivore isn’t “obligated” to not eat fruit. Obligate carnivores can and do eat fruit. Obligate carnivores are just “obligated” to eat meat, regardless of whether they’re also eating fruit (or whatever else). Cats may not choose to eat as many non-meat foods as dogs, but given the opportunity my cat, for example, chose to eat cantaloupe out of my garden (for which, once I realized that the cat was responsible for the substantial and continuing damage I was seeing, it was obligated to live in a cage until the end of cantaloupe season.)
LOL!
Yes, my vet never saw it that bad, but did see cases. Again though in his 30 plus years of being a Vet, not one person brought in a dog sick from onions or garlic. Reminds me if one drinks enough water they will die, not quite the same, but anything in the wrong amount can be dangerous.
What I really like about my dog is he does not have the urge to gorge like most dogs. Once I fed a dog graham crackers, it kept wanting more, so I kept giving them. Then the dog puked. I offered another and it ate it! You win! I could not believe it. Jesse my Aussie, eats till full and leaves the rest of his food. I just fill the bowl to it’s rim and it lasts 3 or 4 days. He is so human like and intelligent. He watches TV and loves kid’s programs. He likes the puppets, must remind him of his toys. He is 6 and plays daily with his toys. Some are years old, He does not destroy them.
have seen dogs being raised as vegans in poverty-stricken regions, but cats would involve laboratory-concocted food pellets to ensure they get all nutrients they need.
sobering, and ground-breaking to learn that the oldest dog(27 yrs old) was actually vegetarian!
That may be the official record, a friend of mine had a dog that lived till 27 too. It was a cocker spaniel. I have heard others with older dogs. Smaller dogs mostly.
For fun I googled oldest dog and it looks like a few made it to 30.
What is strange is the current holder died in 1939. So I looked it up and the Vegan dog is 4th oldest.
Many claim their dogs made it to 30, but none could confirm it The oldest ever documented was 29 years and 160 days and passed in 1939. Aussie cattle dog.
Back to the topic of giving pets pills…
I have to give my cat pills every day. I highly recommend those pill pusher things that look like a syringe. I’m pretty good at pilling both cats and dogs without one, but the pill pusher makes it so much easier.
When I was a kid we used to have a dog that would eat serviceberries right off the bush. The bushes were always stripped bare as high as the dog could reach. I’m sure it wasn’t good for her to eat so many, but we never noticed any ill effects.
After reading this thread I experimented with my two dogs. I had some fresh figs and rubbed some of the inside bits onto a finger. Iris gladly licked the fig bits off my finger while Shadow literally turned her nose away from it. To put things in perspective, Iris loves carrots and jump on anything falling off the table, but she generally won’t eat tomatos and lettuce, etc. Shadow will sometimes eat carrots, but is more likely to spit it out (and Iris will dart in and steal it).
Funny story: In the mornings before i leave for work, I put together some fruit for the kids to eat with their breakfast and leave it out on the counter. One time I washed a bunch of grapes and left it out. An hour or so later I get a call from my wife asking why I only washed 6 grapes and had left 3 of them on the floor…Well Shadow had taken it upon herself to snack on them. We watched her closely for any adverse signs, but didin’t see any - but she’s never gone for grapes again.