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Picture this. It’s the hottest part of the afternoon. The pavement is shimmering. Your dog is flat out on the kitchen tiles, tongue out, not moving a muscle – and you’re wondering whether that’s just “being a good dog on a hot day,” or whether something more serious is creeping up on you both.
Summer should mean long evenings, paddling at the beach, and your dog flopping into bed happily exhausted. But heat is one of the few things that can turn dangerous astonishingly fast – sometimes within minutes – and most owners don’t realise just how little margin for error their dog actually has.
So let’s go through this properly. How to keep your dog comfortable day to day, how to spot the early warning signs before things become an emergency, and one danger that catches even experienced, water-loving dogs off guard.
Here’s the bit most people don’t know: your dog can’t sweat their way out of trouble. A few sweat glands in their paw pads aren’t going to make a dent in a 30C day. Instead, dogs rely almost entirely on panting and on blood vessels near the surface of their skin (especially around the ears and face) widening to release heat.
That’s a far less efficient cooling system than ours – which means your dog can go from “a bit warm” to “dangerously overheated” much faster than you’d expect, especially during exercise.
Water, water, everywhere. Put out several bowls, not just one – in the kitchen, the garden, by the back door. Dogs sometimes won’t bother walking across a hot room for a drink, so make it easy. A few ice cubes dropped in keeps it appealing for longer.
If you’ve got a dog who’s a bit half-hearted about drinking even when it’s warm, Better Hydration is a product I’m a big fan of – it’s designed specifically to encourage dogs to drink more, which matters far more in a heatwave than most owners realise. Goats milk is another good trick: freeze it into an ice cube tray and pop one or two cubes into the water bowl. Most dogs find it irresistible, and you get the hydration benefit alongside the cooling one.
Walk like you mean it – early or late. Save walks for first thing in the morning or once the evening has cooled off. If you’re not sure whether it’s safe underfoot, press the back of your hand to the pavement and hold it there. If you can’t keep it there comfortably, it’s too hot for paws.
And if you genuinely can’t get out at a cool enough time – work starts too early, it’s still warm well after dark, whatever the reason – it is completely fine to shorten the walk, or skip it altogether for a few days. I know that feels uncomfortable, especially with a Collie giving you those pleading eyes from the back door. But a few days of little or no formal exercise will not harm your dog. They’ll happily potter about the garden, sleep more than usual, and be perfectly ready to pick back up where you left off the moment the weather breaks. A quiet, slightly bored dog on the sofa is infinitely better than a dog in genuine danger on a hot pavement.
Swap the lead clip. Walking from a harness rather than a collar means there’s no pressure on your dog’s airway, which matters more than ever in heat – panting needs a clear airway to actually work.
Don’t reach for the clippers. It’s tempting to think a shave will help, but for most dogs (yes, even double-coated breeds) the coat is doing a genuine job of insulating against heat and UV. Regular brushing to remove the dead undercoat does far more good than a buzz cut.
Give their brain something to do that isn’t running. A frozen Kong or stuffed feeder – meal mixed with a little water or unsalted broth, then frozen – keeps your dog settled and mentally satisfied without raising their temperature the way a game of fetch would. This is honestly one of my favourite hot-weather tools. The KONG Classic is the one I reach for most, and the KONG Stuff-A-Ball is a great second option if you want a bit of variety in the rotation. For what to actually fill them with, Holly Barker’s Recipes and Remedies for a Life with Dogs is full of brilliant ideas beyond the usual peanut butter and kibble.
Build them a cool spot – and let them choose it. Tiled floors, a shaded patio corner, or a paddling pool in the shade all give your dog somewhere to retreat to of their own accord. Honestly, I’ve never found cooling mats make much difference in practice – Collies in particular are pretty switched on at finding their own cool spot to flop in without any help from a gadget. The same goes for cooling jackets; I get far better results just wetting the dog down properly with cold water than I ever have from a jacket.
Know your dog’s personal risk factors. Overweight dogs, very young or older dogs, and dogs with heart or breathing conditions all run hotter, faster. If that’s your dog, treat the guidance above as the minimum, not the optional extra.
This is the part I really want you to read properly, because early heatstroke looks deceptively mild.
Early signs to watch for:
As it progresses, you may see:
If you see any of the early signs, stop whatever you’re doing immediately – the walk, the game, the training session, all of it – and act.
What to actually do:
Even if your dog seems to perk up once they’ve cooled down, please still get them checked. The damage heatstroke can do internally (to the kidneys, the gut, blood clotting) isn’t always visible from the outside, and dogs who are seen early with mild signs have a dramatically better chance of a full recovery than those who aren’t seen until things are already serious.
If your dog would happily spend all day launching themselves into a lake after a ball, there’s a second risk worth knowing about – one that has very little to do with temperature at all.
It’s called water intoxication, and it happens when a dog swallows a large amount of water in a short space of time, usually while swimming hard or repeatedly diving for a toy with their mouth open. All that swallowed water dilutes the salt (sodium) level in their blood, and their cells respond by absorbing even more water to try to rebalance – which is exactly the opposite of helpful.
It’s rare, but it’s serious, and the dogs most likely to end up in this situation are often the keenest swimmers – the ones who’ll dive in for “just one more” throw of the ball without ever pausing for breath. One well-known case involved a Border Collie who emerged from a river staggering and being sick after diving in again and again for a ball, mouth open each time – thankfully, after a few frightening days at the vet, that dog made a full recovery.
Signs to watch for after a swim:
How to actually prevent it:
This is exactly the kind of thing a quick “settle” or a Sit on the bank between throws can help with – not just for arousal regulation (which is its own conversation entirely), but as a genuine physical safety net.
None of this is about wrapping your dog in cotton wool or cancelling summer. It’s about knowing your dog well enough to catch the early signs, building a few simple habits into hot days without much effort, and knowing exactly what to do in the first sixty seconds if something does go wrong. That’s the difference that actually matters.
If you’d like more of this kind of practical, no-nonsense guidance – especially if you live with a Border Collie who thinks heat exhaustion is for other dogs – come and join us inside the Collie Culture Club. It’s where I share this stuff in more depth, answer questions in real time, and generally make sure nobody’s muddling through alone.
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P.S. If there’s one thing to take from this post, let it be this: heatstroke and water intoxication both progress fast, but they’re both very survivable when you act on the early signs rather than waiting to see if they pass. Trust the wobble. Trust the slightly-too-quiet dog. You know your dog better than the heat does.
