How to Tell If Your Dog Needs More Water

1 Overview

What is dehydration?

Dehydration occurs when a dog loses more water than it takes in. Blood flow is then badly disrupted, reducing the amount of oxygen delivered to the organs.

Dehydration also causes the loss of electrolytes, and in severe cases can lead to organ failure and even death.

What does water mean to a dog? Beyond meeting daily needs, water lubricates the joints, eases the strain on the organs, aids digestion, and helps regulate body temperature.

What’s more, water supports the body’s many cells, helping them better absorb the nutrients from food.

Put simply: dog dehydration equals danger.

How do dogs get dehydrated?

Like a machine, a dog loses water every day while also taking it in.

Urination is only one way water is lost; panting through the mouth, cooling through the paws, and defecation are all normal daily ways a dog loses water.

Having covered what dehydration is, let’s now talk about its causes and how to spot it.

What abnormal causes lead to dehydration?

The most common case is simply not drinking enough, but look at it the other way: a healthy dog that realizes it needs water will naturally go drink.

On the other hand, dogs with other illnesses that won’t drink, or whose bodies can’t absorb the water they do drink, become dehydrated from low intake – kidney disease being a common example.

So most owners needn’t worry about low intake; just change the water regularly, keep it clean, and make sure there’s always enough – those three points are enough.

Many other things cause dehydration – diarrhea, vomiting, heatstroke, and so on – and small or weak dogs are more prone to it.

How do you spot dehydration?

Some will say: check how fast the skin on the neck springs back.

That method does work, but there are others to tell if a dog is dehydrated. And some dogs are born with extra neck skin, which an inexperienced owner can easily mistake for dehydration.

So what other signs of dehydration are there?

The dog loses its appetite, and may vomit, have diarrhea, become listless, pant, or have sunken eyes;

dry eyes, a dry nose, and dry, sticky gums with thick saliva.

Here’s a closer look at the gum test: press the gum and judge dehydration by how fast the capillaries in it refill with blood.

Press a finger on the gum, release after 3 seconds; the gum will turn white, and a healthy dog’s gum returns to pink in about a second, while a dehydrated dog takes much longer.

How do you deal with dehydration?

Unpleasant as it is to hear, dehydration often comes with something more serious.

If a dog shows the signs above, offer water right away; if it refuses to drink, rush it to the vet, because this is clearly more than simple dehydration.

Don’t try to treat a dehydrated dog yourself. As noted, these dogs lack not just water but electrolytes, so the vet is the best choice.