Hey Ho, Teddy here. Me and Emmie’s hoping all you dog pals had a GOOOOOOD Thanksgiving!
Mom took us to the dog park and there were so many dog pals there! I made two new friends. One big white dog, and he was big, bigger even than Emmie. His legs were taller than my head! A giant among dog pals, he was. The other was a Chihuahua who’s not as big as my cats! HA! I saw the big and small at the dog park! The Chihuahua was wearing a coat. At first I thought it was silly, but then I got to thinking about it….she’s little and she doesn’t have a natural fur coat like me, so I bet she was cold that day and the coat helped keep her warm!
Then I got to thinking about it even more (understand, dog pals, I did my thinking at home, not when I was at the dog park – there were too many fun things going on to think about the quandaries of life there) and I decided it was very smart of her human companion to help her stay warm.
So, dog pals, I’ve got some ideas you can tell your human folks about. These ideas will help us all during the cold, snowy winter coming up!
I’m giving you four tips, one for each paw! HA!
- Watch our tails, ears and feet so we don’t get frostbite!
- Like my new Chihuahua dog pal, we can be kept safe and cozy with coats and even booties!
- Keep the hair in our toes and footpads trimmed so we don’t get iceballs stuck there. That’s brrrrrrrrr, cold!
- Take us outside for a shorter time, but let us outside more often. We do have to go outside to do our business and have fun but we like to be warm by the fire too!
Ok, dog pals, this is a bonus tip. This one is for your tail – HA!
Tell your human folks to watch out for signs of hypothermia – that means our body temperature is getting low and that’s not good, dog pals! When that happens our humans will notice us shivering, we can be stiff, sluggish and clumsy, our heart rate and breathing rate will go down, our pupils can become dilated and we can collapse. Not good, dog pals, not good! Tell your human if they see that happening to warm you up slowly, like wrapping you in a cozy blanket. But dog pals, they need to call your vet too, and see what your vet recommends. Cuz you know what? Sometimes we need more help than our folks can give us. So it’s GOOOOD to have a vet handy!
Dog pals, you follow good ol’ Teddy’s tips and you will have a good, safe and fun winter time!
Over and out,
Teddy
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Teddy,
My Shepherd/Husky cross Ginger gets so terribly scared at the vet’s office that she shakes and shakes like a quaking aspen in a hurricane! She tries desperately to get out of there even though she knows the people are nice and kind and share treats, because sometimes she’ll get poked prodded or stuck with things that hurt. How can I calm her down when her fears are in full fury?
Hey Ho, Teddy here!
Ginger, I hear ya on that! I don’t like going to the vet either, but ya know, dog pal, sometimes we just gotta do things we don’t like!
So here’s what Mom does to help me & my sister Emmie when it comes to going to the vet. Sometimes she takes us when they don’t stick us or prod us! Like, she’ll tell us we’re going to the vet, but when we get there she’s just picking up food or meds for one of us! So we go to the vet lots & lots of times until it’s not really a big deal. Mom tricks us!
But ya know what, dog pal? It sounds like you are really scared! So here’s what I’m going to do for ya. I’m going to write somethin’ up for the blog here so I can go into more detail. Whatcha think of that? So you keep watching for my post, it’ll be here soon!
In the meantime, remember to work your humans for treats! HA!
Over & out,
Teddy