Tomorrow is the first day of summer, and temperatures across Iowa are forecast to be back in the 90s by the weekend. Iowans who own dogs likely know that most pooches love to take a swim when it’s hot.
If your canine likes to cool off in the water, the Humane Society’s Michelle Casey says there are a few things you should do to protect your pet.
“Swimming in the summer is a great way for dogs to cool off, whether it’s a river, a lake, or even if you just get a baby pool and put it in your backyard,” Casey says. “You do need to be careful, because there are pathogens in the water that the dogs can be contaminated with, and then they can get sick.”
Casey says you’ll need to do more than just towel off your dog after a swim to make sure the hound stays healthy.
“If they’re swimming, having a good time, that’s great. Just whenever you get home, I would just suggest you give them a nice bath, wash them off to make sure that they’re not going to get any kind of skin irritation,” Casey says. “And then definitely just watch out for the animal’s body language. If anything changes with their stool or their urine or anything like that, that would suggest the dog has ingested some sort of a parasite.”
She notes, there are also vaccines to help protect dogs from some parasites.