Is Daffodil / Narcissus safe for cats and dogs?
| Species | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Cats | Toxic |
| Dogs | Toxic |
Severity: Severe
Read the full first-aid guide: what to do if your pet ate something toxic
Daffodils pose two separate risks in a US home depending on the season. Outdoors, bulbs planted or naturalized in fall lawns and beds carry the highest concentration of lycorine and related alkaloids in the bulb itself - a dog that digs one up risks vomiting, drooling, and diarrhea, with large ingestions escalating to tremors, low blood pressure, seizures, and cardiac arrhythmia per ASPCA.
Indoors, the same bulb shows up in a completely different context: paperwhite narcissus are commonly forced in shallow bowls of pebbles and water on countertops and tables from mid-October through late winter, per Iowa State University Extension - successive plantings about two weeks apart can keep blooms coming from Thanksgiving through late March - putting an intact, unburied bulb at nose height for a curious cat or dog for weeks at a time. Because daffodil is rated a severe-toxicity plant, any suspected ingestion, garden bulb or forced paperwhite, warrants an immediate call to ASPCA Animal Poison Control (888-426-4435) or Pet Poison Helpline (855-764-7661), not a wait-and-see approach.
Facts and examples
- Paperwhite narcissus bulbs are forced indoors in bowls of pebbles/gravel with water kept just touching the bulb bottoms, no chilling period needed; successive plantings roughly two weeks apart from mid-October produce continuous blooms from Thanksgiving through late March. (source, verified 2026-07-26)
- Daffodil bulb is the most poisonous part (lycorine and other alkaloids); signs include vomiting, salivation, diarrhea, with large ingestions causing convulsions, low blood pressure, tremors and cardiac arrhythmia. (source, verified 2026-07-26)
Verdict re-verified against aspca.org, 2026-07-26 — confirmed unchanged. Source
This page is for general information only and is not veterinary advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If your pet is showing symptoms, or you think they ate or touched something dangerous, contact your veterinarian or a pet poison-control hotline immediately.
Last verified 2026-07-26