If you keep green tripe treats around for your dog, it’s worth a two-minute trip to your pantry. In June 2024, a widely sold green tripe treat was voluntarily recalled over the possible presence of metal objects in the bags. Nobody’s dog was reported hurt, but a stray piece of metal in a chew is exactly the kind of hazard you want to catch before your dog does.
Here’s who issued it, precisely which products were affected, and what to do if one of them is sitting in your cupboard.
What was recalled
The maker, TDBBS LLC (Top Dog Best Bully Sticks), a Richmond, Virginia company, pulled 3,551 bags of its green tripe over what it flagged as a possible “presence of metal objects.” The affected bags were distributed between February and May of 2024 and sold nationwide, in stores and online. The recall spanned two of the company’s labels, Barkworthies and Best Bully Sticks.
Check your bag against this list. The recall covered:
- Barkworthies Green Tripe, 7-ounce bag — lot codes WO151768 and WO152373
- Best Bully Sticks Green Tripe, 2-pound bag — lot codes WO152669, WO153321, and WO152107
- Best Bully Sticks Green Tripe, 5-pound bag — lot codes WO151401, WO152319, and WO153179
No injuries or illnesses were reported to the company in connection with the affected product. Even so, a possible metal object is a real hazard, so the guidance was simple: if you had one of these bags, you were told to stop using it and throw it away.
What to do if you have one
If a bag in your home matches the list above, don’t feed it. Toss it. If you believe your dog already ate from an affected bag, keep an eye out for anything off, unusual behavior, discomfort, drooling, retching, or signs of pain, and contact your veterinarian right away.
To ask a question or arrange a return, the company directed customers to email Support@BestBullySticks.com or call TDBBS at (877)-583-5853, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET.
“A foreign object in a treat is one of those risks where the odds are low but the downside is high,” says Dr. Mara Chen. “Metal can cut the mouth or gut, or cause a blockage. If you even suspect your dog swallowed something hard, that’s not a wait-and-see, that’s a phone call to your vet the same day.”
A quick word on green tripe itself
Setting the recall aside, green tripe is a genuinely popular and generally good treat. It’s the unprocessed edible stomach lining of animals like cows, sheep, and buffalo, and it packs a lot into a low-calorie chew: protein, magnesium, and amino acids among them. It’s also a natural probiotic, so it can be friendly to a dog’s gut microbiome, and it tends to be easy to digest. Fans feed it as a supplement alongside a dog’s regular diet, on the logic that it delivers the kind of gut-supporting nutrients dogs would once have gotten from eating the whole of their prey.
None of that changes the one habit this recall should reinforce: give any bag of food or treats a quick look before it goes in the bowl, and know the brand and lot number of what you buy.
What’s new since this recall
The good news is that this story has a clean ending. The FDA has since terminated the recall, which is the agency’s way of saying the problem was addressed and the action is closed. So the metal-object concern applies to those specific 2024 lot codes, not to green tripe as a category and not to current bags on the shelf.
The broader takeaway outlasts the recall itself. Treat and food recalls happen quietly and often, and the companies rarely reach you directly. Signing up for a retailer’s recall alerts, or simply keeping the brand and lot code of what you feed, turns a scary headline into a 30-second check.
References
- TDBBS LLC Recalls Green Tripe Dog Treats Due to Potential Foreign Metal Object Contamination, U.S. FDA
- TDBBS issues recall on Green Tripe treats, Pet Food Processing
If you think your dog swallowed a foreign object or is unwell, contact your veterinarian right away.
