Stupid Humans

I knew today was going to be hot, but I wanted to take Brutus out for his walk, and I figured if we walked before noon, and I took a bottle of water for Brutus, all would be fine. There was a beautiful breeze, mid eighties and sunny, so off we went. When we got part way through the walk, we stopped and I gave Brutus a nice drink of his water. He seemed to be doing fine. Part way back, he started to slow down, so I did too. Then he got slower and slower and slower. So I did too. I kept giving him sips of water, and trying to walk in the shade of the trees, but it was truly too hot for a big dog to be walking a couple miles. There is this incredibly gross little stream that he had tried to jump in to, and that was a big clue to me that he needed some major cooling down, so when we got home I got a bucket of lukewarm water and washed him down a little, and then brought him in to the air conditioned house. He was trying to lap up water too fast, so I gave him a dish of ice cubes to lick, and put my little fan on him.

Were any of these things the right thing to do? I have no idea. I was going strictly on instinct. I would have let him jump in the lake, but yesterday he scraped up his legs pretty good in the lake when he slid off of a log, and he's been  licking the wounds constantly, so I didn't want to take a chance on getting those dirty, and the lake is pretty cold. It might have been too big of a jolt to an overheated system.

Anyway, he made it through his overheated state, his breathing seems to be back to normal, and he is back outside keeping tabs on the chipmunks. I think that if we walk tomorrow, it will have to be early early in the morning before it even gets above seventy. That was scary. :(