Are galvanized steel tub and dish okay for my dogs to drink from?

A. Hi Bill. Are you sure that what you are calling a "galvanized water dish" actually even is 'a water dish'? If so, I would think it's probably okay for most animals since galvanized feed troughs & watering troughs have been used on farms on decades; in third world countries, sometimes the only water for the family and pets is rainwater collected from the galvanized roof.

But if you're not sure exactly what something is, it's always a bad idea to use it for food or water service that it wasn't designed for. Some galvanized metal gets a post treatment with toxic hexavalent chromium, which would be bad to ingest, and it is easy to confuse cadmium plating with galvanizing, and cadmium is a very bad biocumulative toxin.

A. Hi, Chablis. Although it may be the only thing in their environment that you can think of that has changed, that doesn't necessarily mean it actually is -- this is a question for a vet :-) Although galvanized is not considered a food-safe surface because of potential overdose from acidic foods dissolving it, galvanized watering troughs and feeders have been very widely used by farm animals around the world for many decades. Some areas of the country may even still have galvanized water pipes.

So it doesn't sound especially likely to me that the galvanizing is the issue, but again: don't use things for purposes they weren't intended for because the designer was balancing the pluses and minuses of one material against another for use in a washtub, not a drinking bowl ... plus, dogs aren't people ... we should be careful about extrapolating our experience into believing that what is safe for people is necessarily safe for dogs.

Regards,

A. For many decades many countries have used galvanized steel roofing material to catch rain water for drinking, and in many places storing that water in galvanized steel water tanks.
No adverse effects have been reported nor have restrictions on these materials been introduced.

A. They referred you to us? What do we have to do with their unsatisfactory product? :-)

I don't know exactly what a "dog pan" is. A drinking pan? Or a litter box? Galvanizing can turn black from alkaline materials like dishwasher detergent. If you washed it in the dishwasher, that would almost surely be the problem. Scrubbing it with cream of tartar [on eBay or Amazon] and rubbing off any smut with a cloth or paper towel ought to help a lot. But it is the seller's responsibility to determine if a product is safe for its intended use ... not yours & mine to guess what it's made of and whether it's safe. If you have a house-trained puppy and you're speaking of a litter box, galvanizing will prove entirely unsuitable for urine. Good luck.

Regards,

Normally I would say you have the heat set too high and you are burning the pan but if the dog is still walking around you must not be cooking dogs. I have no idea what a "dog pan" is! I guess logically something must be reacting to the zinc that the pan is coated with. Food, water, dog or otherwise. Short of stopping contact with the above or contact with any other things that may be turning it black, I think the simple answer is to purchase a stainless steel or plastic dog pan! I suppose a pet shop, kennel supply or farm supply would be good places to start. Depending on the size, some sort of stainless kitchen pan would probably be cheaper. By sending you to us the people that sold it to you are obviously just trying to get rid of you. Personally I don't think I would give them any more of your money. I think if I had sold you said Dog pan, I would be replacing it for you with something different that actually did what it was supposed to do. As long as you are using your Dog pan, as a dog pan and not for a purpose other than what it was designed for.

A. Hi Charise. I don't know if you are viewing the situation quite correctly...

Please consider, for example, that while glass is probably the least toxic construction material in the history of the world, you certainly wouldn't consider it safe for your dog to swallow glass shards. What your dog is doing, chewing through a fence, and possibly ingesting sharp bits of metal, sounds like it could be life threatening to him, even without a zinc coating on it. Not to mention that if I had children playing on the other side of that fence, on that third occasion I might demand that the court order the dog be put down :-)

Regards,

A. Hose the fence with bitter apple or a good extreme hot-sauce. Worked great for getting my dogs to quit chewing on things.

A. Zinc is actually an essential trace mineral, BUT the amount of it in the body is in an extremely small range. Too much is as bad or worse than too little. Fortunately, the bodies uptake of it is quite poor or people taking an excess of the zinc tabs for cold mitigation would be dead.

Galvanizing can be very adherent, so I suspect that the dog is tearing the fence up rather than eating it.

The invisible fence that shocks the dog might be an option, especially if you do not want the dog to injure himself.

A. Zinc absolutely IS a toxin to dogs. While there are inherent hazards in ingesting sharp bits of anything, the zinc present in galvanized steel can absolutely be toxic. Zinc toxicosis is characterized by a Heinz body anemia (i.e., red blood cell destruction due to oxidative damage), which can necessitate blood product transfusion. So, if a galvanized item, such as a screw or nut, is ingested by a dog, it must be retrieved either endoscopically or surgically to prevent complications that may include death.

I do not know if there are any data regarding drinking from galvanized containers, but I personally would not use them for the aforementioned reasons.

I and other veterinarians cannot stress enough that any questions regarding the health of your pets need to be referred to your veterinarian, not unregulated internet forums.

Thanks Dr. Gagnon. Yes, professional consultations trump internet blather! We never challenge veterinarians, and remind readers constantly that dogs aren't people.

Dog fatally poisoned by one penny

A writer claimed that a manufacturer referred them to this site for comment, but we don't even know what the dish was made of :-)

If you know of a free veterinarian forum, please post the URL because asking each dog owner to do an individual consultation with their vet regarding what material a dog bowl should be made of sounds silly, and asking people to stop posting in public forums isn't realistic (as billions of Facebook users have proven).

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey

A. Just as an addition to the toxicity of galvanized bowls and fencing. Animals that have these bowls or fencing where they may chew or lick are getting an excess in zinc as stated before. This is more a dietary issue than a toxicity issue. Zinc interferes with the absorption of copper if enough is ingested. Typical symptoms include loss of hair color , loss of hair, decreased vigor and activity, ataxia and sometimes death. Unfortunately the symptoms can be similar to other ailments.

A. Hi Jim. You've seen Dr. G's advice that he would not use a galvanized tub as a watering dish, and to ask your vet about this. A tub meant for livestock watering, and of proper quality, does not need further coatings to serve its purpose and probably should last at least several years. Good luck!

Regards,

A. Hi Michael. Dr. G, above, says that he would not use a galvanized watering dish; it surely can't be a big deal to get a plastic or stainless steel replacement, or use an old china serving bowl.

But I'm sure you realize that despite your misfortune, a dog dying from unknown causes isn't strong evidence of whether or not the coating on their watering dish was the culprit.

Regards,

Thanks, Ted, for the response. I highly doubt that the galvanized dish has anything to do with my dogs' ailments, but it can't hurt to change, just to be safe. I am a farmer and many of my animals drink from galvanized troughs. Some even eat from galvanized feed dishes, and they're just fine. I think something else has happened with my dogs and I'll just have to wait to see what the vet says. Again, thank you for your help.