Like people, animal’s bodies become accustomed to the climate they live in. Getting used to the cold is harder when we’re exposed to frequent changes in temperature – one minute warm, the next minute cold. It’s usually recommended that a dog meant to live outside should be kept outside much of the time. This doesn’t mean, though, that your dog must stay out constantly during periods of extreme cold or inclement weather. Please do bring your dog in when it’s not fit outside for man nor beast!

Although dogs do maintain a normal blood heat that’s a couple of degrees higher than a human’s temperature, we still have to give them some help to stay warm in cold weather.

Start with a small, cozy, insulated dog house. The house needs to be small to trap and hold your dog’s body heat which will help keep him warm through the night. It should be just large enough for your dog to stand, turn around and lay in comfortably. The house can be homemade but new insulated plastic models available today are inexpensive and designed especially for comfort in cold weather.

Put the house in a sheltered location out of the wind. Make use of the sun’s warmth by putting it on the east or south side of your home. Placing it on a low platform to keep it off the frozen ground particularly concrete will help. The house should have a door or heavy flap over the entrance to exclude drafts.

Blankets and quilts are okay for people inside heated homes but outside, they trap moisture that can make your dog damp, chilly and uncomfortable. A more effective bedding is fresh clean hay or straw. They allow moisture to evaporate, retain warmth, are biodegradable and cost only a few pounds a bale. They are readily available from farm supply and feed stores, stables, or local farmers. When buying straw or hay remember that it should smell fresh and pleasant like dried grass clippings. Avoid any that smells strongly of mold or mildew. Spread the bedding generously in the kennel, four-to-five inches thick, and replace as needed.

Hypothermia and frostbite are a real danger, Hypothermia is a lowering of the core body temperature well below the dog’s normal 101.5-102.5 normal temperature. Significant lowering of the temperature interferes with the metabolic functions of the body and affects the internal organs. A dog’s first reaction to this is to shiver. Shivering increases muscle activity, which in turn increases heat production. At the same time, his blood circulation shifts away from his legs and feet to his internal organs.

Mild hypothermia causes an increase in blood pressure and pulse rate, but if the time and severity of heat loss continues, heart rate and blood pressure go down and cardiac arrhythmias or cardiac arrest can occur. Severe hypothermia leads to respiratory depression, lethargy, lack of coordination, paralysis, and collapse.

Treatment for hypothermia usually involves rapid warming of the body. In mild cases, heating pads, hot water bottles, or a warm water bath will work, but severe cases require introducing warmed fluids internally via intravenous flow, dialysis, or enema. Veterinarians may also use other techniques and monitor the dog for heart arrhythmias and pneumonia and check for frostbite.

Prolonged exposure to the cold can also cause frostbite and the death of tissue in the extremities. Dog toes, ear tips, tails,and scrotum are the more common frostbite areas. Frostbitten tissue appears pale and is cold to the touch. It should be rewarmed slowly and given time to heal. It may turn red and swollen and be very painful as it heals. If it doesn’t heal in three or four days, amputation of the dead tissue should be done to avoid gangrene or mummification of the area.

Obviously, prevention is much better than any cure with hypothermia and frostbite. So take some simple precautions:

If yours is an outside dog with a thick double coat, is accustomed to frigid winter weather and has a sheltered place to escape from wind and rain, he can probably stay outside regardless of what winter throws his way. But if he’s old, arthritic, or debilitated in some manner or if his coat’s not heavy enough, let him sleep inside when the temperature dips too close to freezing.

If your dog enjoys her daily outings, by all means continue, but look out for chemical ice-melting compounds on driveways, pavements and streets. If you can’t avoid them, wipe her feet when you return home so she doesn’t ingest the chemical when licking her paws. If the pavement is slushy, put some baby oil or vaseline on her feet before you start out to help prevent slush from forming between the pads of her paws.

If your pet is a puppy or geriatric dog, don’t leave him outside without supervision, especially in snow. Dog feet can get very cold very quickly, especially on thin-coated dogs, and you may have to rescue a shivering pet who cannot walk across the snow.

Winter diet

Dogs may tend to eat more during cold weather, but inclement weather may prevent them from getting enough exercise to burn up extra calories. If your dog begins begging at the table or looking particularly wistful when her dish is empty, beware of just letting her lick the plates or tossing her a morsel of cheese or chicken when you’re preparing dinner. If you’re not careful, she’ll need an exercise programme to slim her waist when spring arrives.

Table scraps can be fed to dogs without ill effects if they replace some of the regular diet, not add to it. Just avoid spicy or fatty foods and keep portions small. A quarter or third cup of boiled chicken meat or turkey giblets in broth or a couple of left-over veggies (unbuttered, without sauce) can be a real treat for a pooch tantalized by the good smells coming from the kitchen.

Food tends to sit around the house during the holidays. Dogs quickly learn about hard candy in a bowl on the coffee table or the box of chocolates that a relative sent over.

Also they learn to scrounge food from guests at a party or from children who drop Christmas cookie crumbs throughout the house. Some dogs will eat wrappers as well in their haste to down the prize before being discovered.

Most of us know that chocolate is poisonous to dogs, but the toxicity depends upon the amount of theobromine in the particular candy the dog has eaten. Dark chocolate and cooking chocolate tend to be high in the substance; milk chocolate tends to have little. Your dog might eat a piece or two of milk chocolate with few or no ill effects, but a
bar of cooking chocolate could kill her.

Even if the ill-gotten gains don’t poison a pooch, they can cause stomach upset, diarrhea, constipation, or intestinal blockages and are hardly worth the momentary acquiescence to pleading eyes and nagging of a hungry pet. Every successful food theft or begging session leads a pet
further down the path to a life of crime. So, as with anti-freeze, the best bet is to control the dog’s access to food throughout the season. It’s not difficult to keep bowls of snack food unreachable, to confine the dog when people are eating, or to clean up the crumbs after snacks and meals to avoid creating a food thief. As with many things in life, preventing problems usually takes less effort than solving them.

Outdoor water dishes

Dogs need fresh water available to them all day even in winter when they are vulnerable to dehydration. Metal objects conduct and lose heat quickly so switching to a heavy plastic dish will help. So will your choice of colour, container size and location. dark colours absorb heat from the sun and a deeper dish will freeze less quickly than a wide, shallow one. In areas where below-freezing temperatures are common, a more effective solution is an electric bucket heater or birdbath defroster.