Just How Hot Does it Get Inside Your Car?
I hate Summer. Maybe because I was born in January? I hate feeling overheated all the time. I even hate summer clothes. And I hate the fact that summer means my dogs can’t come with me for rides in the car as often due to the baking hot sun.
The Too Hot for Spot car thermometer
When the temps hit 70 and above, taking your dog with you in the car can be risky at best, deadly at worst. If you haven’t encountered statistics on how dangerous it is to leave your dog in a parked car in the summer sun (or anytime of year when the temps are over 70 degrees), you must be truly tuned out. But even though most people know the risks, it can be tempting to leave your pup in the car “just for a second” while you run into a store. That’s when trouble can happen.
I recently discovered one of the truly most ingenious, life-saving and valuable products for pets ever created. It’s called Too Hot for Spot and it’s a simple, static cling thermometer that you can attach to a window inside your car. It measures the temp inside your car, and is visible from outside the car. That means that before you even get inside your car, you can see exactly how much the temperatures inside resemble an oven! There are illustrations on the device that show you what is a safe temp range and what temperatures become very dangerous (both at the high end and the low end). AND…people walking by can see the temps, too. Talk about spreading awareness! Bravo and a huge thank you to the inventor of Too Hot for Spot. No car-driving, canine companion family should ever be without one.
A Healthy, Made in USA Chicken Treat, and Staying Aware of Pet Food Recalls
In today’s email from Daily Kibble, we were introduced to a company here in the US that makes, from start to finish, chicken jerky treats for dogs. Kona’s Chips were created by Kona’s mom after Kona became ill from chicken jerky treats that were made in China. If you take a look at most chicken jerky treats, you’ll see “Made in China” on the label. While some companies claim they monitor the manufacturing facility for quality, the fact remains that chicken jerky treats “Made in China” have been causing illness in dogs for the past couple of years.
How does one stay on top of pet food safety alerts and recalls? Thanks to Kona’s website, we discovered a trusted and complete source of recall information. The American Veterinary Medical Association maintains a page on their website of all recalls, and it appears to be kept up to date. Here’s the link. You can also follow them on Twitter.
And we look forward to receiving our sample order of Kona’s Chips, knowing they are safe and made from USDA inspected chicken.
Family Visits… and Emergency Vet Visits
Chocolate truffles
We all know that chocolate is deadly for dogs. And we do our best to keep it safely away from our pets. But during the holidays, when family and friends are visiting, it can be more difficult to make sure that the sweet stuff stays away from our pooches.
Family members were visiting this past week, and unbeknownst to us, left a small bag of rich, dark chocolate truffles (from Kakawa Chocolate House in Santa Fe) on a table in the living room. We were out for two hours, and returned to find remnants of a chewed paper bag and a little paper truffle cup on the floor—the truffles were long gone. Although we have three dogs, only the little one jumps up on that table. I raced from dog to dog, opening their muzzles and putting my nose inside their mouths, checking for the telltale smell of chocolate. But given how quickly the chocolate must have been consumed, it was hard to smell any on their breath.
We called the emergency veterinary hospital and rushed in with all three fur children. Our little dog was seen first, and the contents of her stomach revealed that she had, indeed, eaten most or all of the chocolate. Her big brothers were grateful they didn’t have to have their stomachs pumped! After about an hour, she was given activated charcoal to help absorb any remaining caffeine and theobromine in her system.
But this isn’t the end of the care necessary for chocolate consumption. We learned that the toxic effects of chocolate remain in a dog’s system for four days. The caffeine and theobromine affect three systems: the nervous system, where they can cause tremors, seizure, and death; the cardiac system, where they can cause lethally fast heart rates; and the digestive system, where they can cause vomiting and diarrhea. For the next four days, we had to watch little Lucia closely for a fast heart beat or tremors, and limit her activity to rest and outside only for potty.
While all chocolate is deadly, the heart of what makes it so is the caffeine and theobromine. Both are stimulants, diuretics and are especially potent in dogs. There are three variables that veterinarians use to determine the degree of danger: the darkness of the chocolate (the darker the chocolate, the worse it is for dogs), how recently the chocolate was eaten (the sooner it can be purged from their stomach, the better), and the size of the dog (the smaller the dog, the more potent the effects).
If your dog ever consumes chocolate, contact your emergency veterinarian as soon as possible. They’ll review the situation with you and help determine if your dog needs to be seen. Had we not taken action as quickly as we did, our little dog could have died. Makes us wonder if it’s even worth it to have chocolate in the house at all…
Another Slow Eating Bowl
We at Dog Parent have been fans of the Brake-Fast bowl for some time now. Our two bigger dogs eat out of their Brake-Fast bowls at a more normal speed, slower than they would had they been able to wolf down their meals from a plain bowl. And keeping your dog from wolfing down his meals may help prevent him from developing Bloat.
But we just found a new type of slow-down-the-eating type of bowl that is actually made of stainless steel! The advantage of that, for us, is no food or fish oil smell (which happens when plastic bowls absorb odors). And also, unlike plastic, it’s not a chewable material (if you have dogs who happen to enjoy chewing their bowls).
ChoCho with his Durapet bowl.
The Durapet Slow Feed bowl is a simple design that the dogs honestly seem to enjoy. It doesn’t seem so much like hard work for them to get their food…more like a leisurely gastronomic journey around a circular track. And there’s a skid-free, rubber bottom which is actually attached to and part of the bowl—a much more sturdy design than those rubber rings they sometimes put on metal bowls which come off and trap bacteria and debris inside. So now, there’s no nosing the bowl around the entire kitchen floor while eating. The pups simply eat methodically around the circumference of the bowl, in one place. Pretty neat. And for my three-legged dog, who eats on a raised surface, that’s really important.
But still, we hadn’t found anything for our little dog, who also likes to eat too quickly. Until visiting our favorite local natural pet food store, Long Leash on Life. There, we found the perfect bowl for little dogs.
The Petrageous Slow Munchin Bowl for our little Lucia.
The Petrageous Slow Muchin Bowl is ceramic and designed with a raised bone in the middle, and two curved raised sections on the sides that create a simple maze for a little muzzle to navigate while eating. Our little Lucia was quite surprised the first time we fed her from that bowl. For the first time, she didn’t finish her meal before her big brothers! Since the bowl is ceramic, it has the same advantages as the stainless Durapet bowls. We just have to be more careful not to drop it!
