February is National Pet Dental Health Month
Oral hygiene is an important but an often over-looked part of your canine's health. Performing regular dental evaluations are essential to your canine's performance
Dental health isn’t always glamorous. It starts with subtle behavior changes and can end with rotten teeth.
CAUTION TOY: For those whose dog loves to play and chew tennis balls we will want to be cautious and only use them for training or to play with in small increments of supervised play. Why might you ask? The fuzz on a tennis ball is quite abrasive and can accumulate dirt and sand that only increases the abrasiveness of the ball. As they chew on the ball the fuzz acts like sandpaper, gradually wearing down their teeth. If your dog can’t handle tennis balls without chomping obsessively or getting overly excited, you may want to consider an alternative toy. A rubber ball, especially one designed for powerful chewers, makes an excellent tennis ball substitute.
Signs:
Odor from the mouth
Loose or damaged teeth
Reluctance to eat or loss of appetite
Excessive Drooling
Working Dogs:
Failure or reluctance to bite in training
Once on the bite, easy to out or re-adjust of bite
Shallow bite – Dog may develop a frontal bite making them more prone to tooth injuries, neck injuries, loss of bite or failure to out.
How you can make a difference:
routine brushing
Routine professional dental exams, scaling and polishing
-Jessica Koch, RVTK9 Medical Director
Check out our Friends over at Animals-R-Special, New Albany, OH: They have a great Blog Post on The Good. The Bad. The Ugly when dealing with your pet's dental health. They are also running a special till the end of the month, 20% off a dental cleaning!
Comments