FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — As medical marijuana becomes more widely legalized, veterinarians are seeing an unintended consequence affecting pets.

Animal poison control centers are reporting a nearly 300% increase in marijuana-related calls over the last several years.

For Hannah Branson, a pet emergency started with chocolate.

“The first thing I see when we walk in is just foil everywhere all over the floor,” Branson said.

Branson had recently adopted Falcore, a small terrier-Chihuahua mix.

“I glance over at the dining room table and the bowl is completely empty so my heart sank,” she said.

She said she had no idea her new puppy would be able to climb onto the table and help himself to a bowl full of chocolate Easter candy.

‘The bowl was pretty full, it was a Costco-size bag, so quite a decent amount, for sure,” Branson said when asked about how much chocolate Falcore ate.

Unsure what to do, she rushed her 5-pound dog to an emergency veterinarian.

“They give an injection which induces vomiting pretty much immediately, so he started throwing up and the amount that he threw up, they were like, ‘Oh wow, he ate a lot of chocolate,’” she said.

Chocolate toxicity remains a major concern for pets, but veterinarians say it is no longer the most common toxin they treat.

“More and more often, we’re seeing people come in with marijuana toxicity cases. It’s one of the more common toxicities that we see,” said Dr. Ignacio Casali of Veterinary Emergency Group in Fort Lauderdale.

“THC, chocolate, chocolate and mushrooms, now we’re seeing it a lot,” he said.

Casali said he sees at least one case a week, and sometimes more, involving pets that have eaten THC edibles or marijuana-infused chocolate.

“It can get dangerous at high quantities, especially now that for humans, they are selling it in concentrated forms,” he said.

The dosage intended for adults can be far too much for small animals.

Early symptoms include lethargy, confusion, glassy eyes and trouble walking.

“They are losing balance, they’re walking around and they’re kind of falling to the side and they’re doing the bobbling head sometimes. They are walking into the hospital and they are dribbling urine,” Casali said.

Veterinarians say one of the biggest challenges is getting accurate information about what an animal may have ingested.

“The more information we have, the easier it is for us, because we do have toxicity calculators with chocolate, with THC. We can plug in the patient’s weight and the amount of THC they were exposed to and immediately we have an idea of how heavy the symptoms are going to be,” Casali said.

Treatment typically includes fluids and support for blood pressure and body temperature.

Veterinarians say THC toxicity is mostly treatable and usually nonlethal, with most side effects subsiding within 12 to 24 hours.

Back at home, Branson said she is relieved Falcore has returned to his normal energetic self, keeping his older sister Pippa busy.

The incident left her with a $500 veterinary bill.

While Branson is comfortable talking about her dog’s chocolate overdose, veterinarians say some pet owners are reluctant to admit when their animals may have consumed marijuana because of the stigma surrounding it.

“Nothing is forcing me to report to the authorities about what the dog got exposed to. Our main goal here is to help pets, no matter what toxicity it is,” Casali said.

Veterinarians recommend keeping all candies, chocolates and THC products out of reach of pets.

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