Staying Safe

The Holiday Decorations Most Likely to Land Your Pet in the ER

The tree, the tinsel, the chocolate under it: a vet's field guide to what actually sends cats and dogs to the emergency room over the holidays, sorted by how they hurt, plus the one plant that can kill a cat in two days.

By Dr. Mara Chen, Senior Veterinary Editor

April 26, 2026 · 8 min read

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For a few weeks a year, your home fills up with things your pet has never encountered: a whole tree indoors, glittering strings at nose height, bowls of candy, plants that showed up in cellophane. To a curious cat or dog, that is not décor. It is a brand-new sensory playground, and some of the equipment is dangerous. The goal here is not to strip the joy out of the season. It is to know which items actually put animals in the emergency room, so you can enjoy the rest without a knot in your stomach.

It helps to stop thinking of these hazards as a numbered list of ornaments and start sorting them by how they hurt. There are three main ways the holidays injure pets: things they swallow, things that poison them, and things that shock or burn. Here is each, in the order an emergency vet tends to worry about them.

The things they swallow

This is the category that most often ends in surgery, and the classic offender is string-like: tinsel, ribbon, and garland. Vets call these “linear foreign bodies,” and they are uniquely nasty. When a length of ribbon or tinsel is swallowed, one end can anchor while the rest travels on, bunching the intestines up like a drawstring and, in the worst cases, sawing through the intestinal wall. Cats are especially drawn to the stuff.

The rule that surprises people: if you see string, tinsel, or ribbon disappearing into your pet, whether it is coming from the mouth or trailing from the other end, do not pull it and do not cut it. Tugging can do more damage inside. Get to a vet. The warning signs of a developing blockage are vomiting, diarrhea, a fading appetite, and a generally flat, depressed mood, and early surgery is what saves these patients.

Ornaments belong here too. They read as decorations to you and as snacks to your pet, and a swallowed ornament can cause the same kind of obstruction. Glass ones add a second hazard: they fall, they shatter, and they cut paws and mouths. Hang the breakable and the tempting ones well above the reach of paws and noses.

And a holiday-food trap that lives in this category rather than the poison one: bones and long-lasting chews. Cooked bones splinter into sharp fragments that can shred the digestive tract on the way through, and rawhides and bully sticks carry a real choking and blockage risk. A festive bone is not the treat it looks like.

The things that poison them

Some of the season’s prettiest and most ordinary items are toxic. Start with the plants, because a few are genuinely serious.

Lilies are a feline emergency. Any part of the plant, even a nibble or a lick of pollen, can cause fatal kidney failure in cats. Early signs are lethargy and vomiting, and without fast treatment most affected cats develop kidney failure within 36 to 48 hours. If a cat and a lily share a room, remove the lily.
Amaryllis harms dogs and cats. This popular red bloom (also called belladonna-lily) commonly triggers vomiting, diarrhea, and belly pain, and can progress to low blood pressure and liver damage.
Poinsettia is overhyped, but not nothing. Its reputation as a killer is largely a myth; it is only mildly irritating. Research estimates an average animal would need to eat 500 to 600 leaves to reach truly toxic levels. Expect, at most, some mouth and stomach irritation and occasional vomiting, and treat only if signs appear.
Mistletoe and holly can hit harder than you’d guess. Serious poisonings are uncommon but real. Mistletoe in dogs usually shows up as drooling, vomiting, and diarrhea, but larger exposures have been linked to cardiovascular collapse, breathing trouble, and a slowed heart rate.
Even the tree and its water count. Tree-stand water holds sap and preservatives that can cause vomiting and diarrhea, and pine needles can scratch the esophagus and lead to vomiting, drooling, lethargy, and trembling. An artificial tree sidesteps some of this; a barrier around the base handles the rest.
Potpourri is more irritating than festive. The dried plant material and additives irritate skin, mouth, and gut. Ingestion can bring drooling, appetite loss, vomiting, and sometimes disorientation; skin contact may need a gentle bath and, occasionally, veterinary care.

Then the foods. “People food” we treat as harmless can be outright toxic to pets:

Chocolate contains caffeine and theobromine, both toxic to dogs and cats, and it is the single biggest holiday poison-control call.
Grapes and raisins have been linked to kidney failure in dogs, which puts fruitcake and trail mix on the no list.
Onions (and their allium relatives) damage red blood cells in both species.
Macadamia nuts cause dogs a strange cluster of neurological signs: weakness, apparent pain, disorientation, and tremors.
Fatty scraps like meat trimmings are a leading trigger of stomach upset, vomiting, diarrhea, and pancreatitis, a genuinely dangerous inflammation that spikes every holiday season.

“The pattern I see every December isn’t one dramatic poisoning, it’s the quiet pile-up: a little ribbon, a chocolate off the coffee table, and three relatives who each fed the dog ‘just a bite’ of the roast,” says Dr. Mara Chen of the Pet Times team. “Decide before guests arrive that the pet gets their own safe treats and nothing from the table, and tell everyone. That one boundary prevents most of the emergencies I treat.”

The things that shock or burn

Holiday lights are cheerful and, to a chewing pet, a live wire. Decorative light strings pose a real electrocution risk when bitten. Signs of a shock range from a dazed, confused look to trouble breathing, burns inside the mouth, seizures, and, in the worst cases, sudden death. Keep strings and cords out of reach, protect the cord runs, use grounded three-prong extension cords, and follow the manufacturer’s usage limits. If you suspect a shock, treat it as an emergency and go straight to a vet.

Keep this number handy

If your pet eats something they shouldn’t, do not wait for symptoms to decide. Call your veterinarian, an emergency clinic, or the ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center at (888) 426-4435, which is staffed around the clock. Fast advice often means the difference between a phone call and a hospital stay.

What’s new since this was written

The scale of the problem keeps growing. In 2024 the ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center handled more than 451,000 calls about possible toxin exposures, a nearly 4 percent jump over the prior year, and chocolate continued its slow climb up the rankings, much of it from wrapped chocolate gifts left under the tree within a dog’s reach. The other steady lesson from recent poison-control data is that human medications and human food and drink now top the list year-round, so the holidays mainly concentrate a risk that is always present: keep purses, gift bags, and coffee-table candy where paws can’t get them, not just the tree.