A grim reminder recently made local head­lines that it’s that time of year to exer­cise cau­tion about leav­ing dogs, and in this case a tod­dler, in a car where they can over­heat and die.

The tod­dler inci­dent is under inves­ti­ga­tion, but seems to be one of those unfor­tu­nate cases where the par­ents for­got the child was in the car. She was recov­ered by passer-bys, but irre­versible heat dam­age had been done and she later died at the hos­pi­tal. This is the sev­enth case this year nation­ally and the sec­ond in Texas. Not the sort of record where you really want to be in the lead.

Chil­dren dying of hyper­ther­mia (over­heat­ing) is tracked and last year there were 49 deaths. One can only imag­ine the num­ber of cases where dogs are involved, as many peo­ple still think a dog is safe in a car with the win­dows slightly cracked. On an 80° day, it only takes 30 min­utes for a car to reach an inter­nal tem­per­a­ture of 114.° Too hot for Fido! Here’s a chart cre­ated by the San Fran­cisco Uni­ver­sity show­ing how quickly tem­per­a­ture in a car can rise: Esti­mated Vehi­cle Inte­rior Air Tem­per­a­ture v. Elapsed Time

Dogs are prone to over­heat­ing more than humans because they only sweat through their paws and nose. For our crew, we use crate fans to keep air cir­cu­lat­ing on long trips and ring­side at shows, but know fans are only effec­tive for dogs as long as there is cooler air to blow on them. Because dogs don’t sweat like we do, they don’t ben­e­fit from evap­o­ra­tive cool­ing like humans. Pant­ing is their way of accom­plish­ing heat exchange; let­ting hot air out, pulling cooler air in. If there is no cool air to bring in, body tem­per­a­ture can rise to dan­ger­ous levels.

What many peo­ple don’t know is that once a dog has under­gone heat­stroke, that dog is affected for life and will always be at a higher risk for heat­stroke and pos­si­ble death. The body under­goes a phys­i­o­log­i­cal change, which is what hap­pen to the tod­dler men­tioned at the top of this arti­cle. Here’s is a link to a short and easy-to-read arti­cle of how this hap­pens, why, and how to pre­vent it. Down­load the arti­cle: Heat­stroke by Linda Kalmar, DVM, cour­tesy of the French Bull Dog Club of Amer­ica.

Show travel is always stress­ful, because stops to get gas and potty the human require a dash into a gas sta­tion or fast food restau­rant, leav­ing pooches in the car. If it’s a hot day, keep­ing the car really cold and park­ing in the shade gives about a 5–10 minute win­dow, enough time to get all the tasks done. What gets aggra­vat­ing is a wait for the restroom, or the slow poke in the check-out line, tak­ing for­ever as you try to pay and leave. (C’mon! Do you really need those Twinkies, cig­a­rettes, and Slim Jims?! I’ve got dogs in the car!) The worst are Lotto play­ers. They hold up the line, buy­ing huge quan­ti­ties of tick­ets as you stand there and men­tally tick off the sec­onds you have left. I’m sure there have been a few batches of non-winning Texas Lotto tick­ets because they were men­tally cursed by the impa­tient, fum­ing dog owner stand­ing behind them. Me!

Oops! I digress. Back to pro­tect­ing your dog from the heat. AVMA has released an excel­lent video, explain­ing how quickly a car can get hot, even on a nice, not-so-hot day.

Visit the National Oceanic and Atmos­pheric Admin­is­tra­tion (NOAA) for even more heat safety tips.
NOAA — Heat: A Major Killer

You are now armed with tools for a safe sum­mer. It’s hot out there, you and your Frenchie stay cool!

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