Doggykingdom Blog

The Effects of Humidity on Your Dog

You are probably keeping an eye on the ambient temperature, but humidity can also impact your pet substantially. A dog pants to release moisture for the animal’s lungs. The process removes heat away from the body’s core. However, if the humidity is too high then your dog cannot cool itself using this process and its temperature will start to spike to dangerous levels.

Keep Pets Safe in the Heat

Your pet can quickly start to overheat, especially snub nose breeds like pugs and bulldogs. Young dogs and seniors are very vulnerable to the increasing warmth. Learn to recognize the symptoms of heat stroke such as:

Excessive panting
Lethargy
Drooling
Vomiting
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Dogs and Heartworm: What You Need to Know to Keep Your Dog Safe

Your dog’s veterinarian will perform a blood test to determine if the animal has heartworms. Ideally, all dogs should undergo testing for heartworms at seven months of age before the owner puts the dog on a heartworm preventative. If a dog is infected and you start prevention, the prevention will not cure the infestation. Heartworm preventatives do not effectively kill adult heartworms. In fact, giving a heartworm preventative medication to a dog with heartworms can lead to the animal’s death by triggering a shock reaction within the animal.

Protect Your Dog from Mosquitoes

Heartworms can quickly kill your pet if left untreated. The worms are spread via biting mosquitoes. When the larvae of the worms enter the dog’s blood stream that quickly grow to adulthood within about six months. The adult worms reside in the heart and lungs of the animal. Males will reach six inches and females can grow to 12 inches long. After mating, the adult female lays her larvae in the dog’s bloodstream where mosquitoes pick the larvae and spread them to other animals. Heartworm is difficult, dangerous, and costly to treat. Luckily, there are a variety of affordable preventative available from your veterinarian.

Raw Food Diet for Dogs

History of the Raw Food Diet for Dogs

Feeding raw foods to a dog is not a new practice. For decades, sled dogs and racing greyhounds have dined on raw foods. However, feeding the family dog raw foods is relatively new. It was first proposed by an Australian veterinarian named Ian Billinghurst in 1993. He called the diet BARF (bones and raw food - biologically appropriate raw food).

Billinghurst believed that dogs thrived on foods that their ancient ancestors age such as raw bones, meat, and vegetables. He believed that gain-based commercial dog foods were harmful to a canine’s health.

Grain Free Dog Foods

Any time you decide to change your pet’s diet, you’ll need to weigh the pros and cons to determine the benefits vs. the possible drawbacks.

Pros of Grain Free Dog Food Include:

Ample protein
No harmful fillers such as wheat gluten and cornmeal
Easy to digest.
Assists in maintaining healthy weight.
Reduces carbohydrates which is excellent for diabetic canines.
Provides allergy relief in dogs prone to hair loss, hot spots, and itchiness

Keeping Your Dog’s Teeth Clean

It is imperative that you start practicing good dental care for Fido to ensure that your furry buddy lives a healthy life. Luckily, you have a lot of options when it comes to maintaining your dog’s pearly whites.

Brush Your Dog’s Teeth

Your dog’s teeth will benefit from brushing. Ideally, you should brush teeth once a day but if you can't keep up with such a schedule then at least once a week is important. You’ll be amazed how quickly your dog learns to tolerate and even enjoy the brushing. You can purchase specially-designed canine toothpaste in flavors they will love. Do not use human toothpaste on your dog because it contains ingredients such xylitol and fluoride which are toxic to animals.

Dog Spring Allergies: Prevention and Treatment

Symptoms of Spring Allergies in a Dog

When humans experience an allergy, they will typically have a runny nose, itchy eyes, and sneezing. However, respiratory allergy symptoms are not as common in dogs. In fact, most canines display allergies with a skin reaction. You’ll notice reddened irritated segments of skin that flair up and then subside as the allergy season passes.

Your dog might start to excessively lick his skin, over-groom, display bald or thin patches of hair, and develop what is referred to as ‘hotspots’ Hot spots are areas where the fur is absent and the skin becomes badly inflamed, smelly, and itchy. Dogs with allergies often rub their face, head, and snout against furniture. All these symptoms, either alone or in groups, are strong indications that your dog is suffering from allergies.

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What Does Your Dog’s Bark Mean?

Barks that occur in a row typically show the excitement level of the dog. A single bark is usually the pet’s way of saying it is either annoyed or surprised. A long series of barks shows the animal is excited and a very prolonged, drawn out bark is usually a form of alarm. A single or duo of barks shows a much lower level of excitement and extraordinarily little urgency. When your pooch barks in multiple bursts and then starts repeating them in fast bursts each minute then the pet is trying to tell you that they think the situation is urgent and that there might even be a potential crisis looming.

The USA’s New ‘First Dogs” Champ and Major

Champ and Major have again breathed life into the long and very much-loved presidential tradition of having pets in the White House which had died during the four-year reign of the former President Trump who had made no secret of the fact that he was not a dog or cat lover. Prior to Trump, pets had resided in the White House since Thomas Jefferson who kept two bear cups and a mockingbird as pets. Throughout the years the beloved pets have become celebrities adored by the public at large.

Miami Heat and the Helsinki Airport Uses Dogs to Sniff Covid-19

A COVID-19 detection dog can effectively detect the presence of the virus within 10 seconds or less of sniffing. The passenger is asked to take a simple skin swipe and then place it in a container. The dog is then asked to sniff the sample. If the dog alerts to the presence of the virus then the passenger is asked to go directly to the Helsinki University Hospital station.

Have a Heart This February: Give Back to Those in Need

At Doggykingdom, we regularly donate our canine products to NPO (non-profit) dog organizations. In addition, everything you buy from us assists us in helping even more. If you want to make a difference in a pet’s life this February then we invite you to partner with us by shopping at our website.

Also, if you have a dog organisation that you feel strongly about then reach out to us via email:

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