How Much Water Does Your Pet Need?
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Animals are as prone to dehydration as we are. July is Pet Hydration Month and we want to make sure your pet is getting plenty of fresh water to drink and that you know how to tell if your pet is dehydrated.
Water supports our pets and our own health and well-being. Without water, we cannot have proper organ function or digestion, and our bodies cannot remove waste from our systems. The human body is made up of 65% water, but our pets bodies consist of nearly 80% water. This makes proper hydration even more important as very serious health issues can develop when your pets don’t consume enough H20.
As you probably all know by now, we live in the deserts of Arizona, which is why we are so concerned with water intake and why we take it so seriously.
Summers definitely take their toll on our pets, especially with the relatively new addition of haboobs covering us in dust a few times each summer, which leaves our normally beautiful desert that looks like this:
Looking like this:
Arizona is not known for high-quality water, so we have to make it available on our own. And this is why I’m very grateful for the Drinkwell’s water fountains. They just make it easy for us to provide fresh, clean drinking water to our pets.
We have Big Dog fountains in our cat enclosure, two inside our home, and we even a special outdoor water fountain for our pets and any wild animals that may happen by. It’s very important to us to provide drinking options to our pets. This is why we wanted to partner up with PetSafe, who is committed to providing high-quality drinking options to our pets.
[load_module id=”582″]“Most pet parents are unaware of how much water their pet needs on a daily basis,” said Randy Boyd, CEO and Founder of PetSafe. “On average, dogs need one ounce of water per pound of body weight.”
Symptoms of dehydration in pets include sunken eyes, lethargy, loss of appetite, dry mouth or depression. If you think your pet may be dehydrated, encourage them to take the following steps:
[box title=”Helping Dehydrated Dog or Cat” box_color=”#996633″]- Perform a skin “pinch” test: Gently grab a fold of skin and release. If the skin stays pinched together, your pet is very hydrated.
- Take your pet to the veterinarian immediately: Dehydration is an emergency.
- Provide fresh, clean water daily: Ensure your pets have plenty of clean, cool water sources.
- Monitor your pet’s water intake: This is especially important in the hot summer months.
“Just as in nature, moving water is much fresher than stagnant water,” Boyd explains. “Movement constantly breaks the water’s surface tension and draws healthful oxygen from the air into the water. Our pet fountains constantly circulate and filter the water, so it stays cleaner and tastes fresher to give cats—and dogs—the water they seek.”
