It is a normal warm day, but not that hot where everyone is cursing the weather. Incidentally, your dog isn’t running, playing, or doing anything that makes it feel tired. Yet, there they are, sitting beside you with their mouth open and breathing faster than usual, which you can obviously refer to as panting. Surely, this makes you curious about what is going on? Is your four-legged favorite companion okay?
Well, to be honest, panting is one of the most familiar things that dogs, irrespective of the breed, do. However, it is not the way we think, as it is not always about cooling down. While panting is an important aspect of how dogs regulate their body temperature, it can also happen when they become excited, stressed, tired, or simply responding to something happening around them. Thus, once you get a good understanding of why dogs pant, it can tell you more than just whether they are feeling warm or whether it is a sign of what your dog is currently experiencing.
Panting is a dog’s natural cooling mechanism
The basic difference between humans and dogs is that the latter cannot cool themselves like us by sweating across the skin. Dogs have sweat glands, but these play a much smaller role in regulating their body temperature. Therefore, panting becomes necessary for them. When a dog pants, air rapidly moves in and out through their mouth. It helps moisture evaporate from the mouth and respiratory passages, and leads the body to cool down. Increased airflow also aids in moving the heat away from the body. This is the reason you often see your pet dog panting after playtime, a long walk, or an energetic training session. However, as mentioned earlier, the trigger leading a dog to pant is not always related to temperature control.
Excitement can bring on panting
Dog owners must have noticed that no sooner do they pick up the leash, the dog starts panting. The dog might not have taken a single step yet, but in their mind, they realize it is the time for adventure. Excitement naturally increases the heart rate of dogs, including the breathing rate, which naturally makes them pant. Dog owners can also observe the same behavior when someone in the house is preparing dinner, getting ready to go outside, when they spot someone they love, or when they bring out their favorite toy.
In each of the above-mentioned situations, panting usually appears alongside other signs of excitement, and that includes tail wagging, alert expression, bouncing around, and highly energetic behavior.
Stress can make dogs pant
Panting can also be directly associated with stress and nervousness in the dog. A dog may pant during a car journey, at the vet’s clinic, during a thunderstorm, when they are at a place where everyone is unknown, or when something in their environment makes them feel uncomfortable. If you look closely, you will be able to distinguish between stress-related panting, as it appears totally different from the usual post-exercise panting.
Likewise, the dog may also pace, hide, lick their lips, yawn repeatedly, keep their ears back, or seem unsettled. Of course, your dog cannot tell you that it is feeling overwhelmed at a particular moment; you have to detect it from their body language. Stress can also affect a dog’s immune system rapidly, so this aspect demands careful attention.
Some dogs pant even after settling down
Generally, you might assume that once your dog stops running around, their breathing should immediately return to normal. But that just might not happen yet in some dogs. After completion of a rigorous exercise, it can take some time for breathing and heart rate to settle. Therefore, the dog may carry on panting for a while even when it is lying down. A similar experience can happen after an engaging or stimulating experience. For instance, when the doorbell rings, visitors arrive, another dog passes the window, and your dog spends several minutes reacting to all these in excitement. Although each of the activities has stopped, the dog’s body can take a little longer to return to its usual relaxed state.
Panting during comfortable weather conditions
As mentioned at the start, this is something most dog owners find surprising. The dog pants when it isn’t feeling hot, and the room temperature is rather comfortable. So, let us bust a myth here. A comfortable room temperature does not mean your dog will never pant. The obvious reasons are already discussed above. Individual dogs can also have different panting patterns, and it largely depends on their age, size, coat, fitness, and personality. It is by nature that some dogs simply tend to pant more than others. So, as a dog owner, there isn’t much to be worried about regarding their behavior. To put it in a nutshell, no single normal amount of panting can be defined accurately for each dog.
Pay attention to when the panting occurs
One of the easiest ways to identify your dog’s panting is to notice the circumstances in which it is at the present moment. Look for the following aspects:
- What was the dog doing just before it started panting?
- Was it exercising?
- Was it excited about a particular aspect?
- Has anything unusual happened around them?
- Do they seem relaxed or attentive?
- Does the panting stop once they settle down?
For those who do not know, patterns can be surprisingly informative. For instance, panting immediately after a gaming session can be very different from unexplained panting when it is resting quietly. The context matters the most, and every dog owner should keep a note of it. You should also keep an eye on the silent signs where your dog may be in pain.
When panting seems unusual
By now, you realize occasional panting is completely normal. However, a sudden or persistent change in your dog’s usual breathing behavior should never be ignored. So, if the dog starts panting much more than usual, or does so while resting, or seems unable to settle, one should pay attention to what else might have triggered this behavior.
Dog owners should watch out for unusual tiredness, coughing, vomiting, weakness, obvious discomfort, or changes in normal behavior. Each of these makes the situation more important to probe further. Although you need not panic every time the dog pants, the goal is simply to recognize when the behavior seems more unusual than normal. By any chance, if you observe something concerning that involves unexplained change, do not waste time and visit a vet at the earliest.
Watch out for the body language of the dog
As mentioned earlier, panting is only one part of the dog’s way to establish communication. A relaxed dog that is panting after a walk will have a loose body, normal posture, and overall a content expression. While a nervous dog will pant while keeping their body tense, trying to avoid eye contact, pacing, or trying to move away from whatever might be a sign of botheration to them. So, as it is evident, the same behavior can have different meanings depending on what surrounds it.
Moving on to the bigger picture
Indeed, dogs pant a lot and that too without any reason, as we might think. Cooling themselves after exercise is perhaps the one to which all of us are familiar. But the panting related to excitement, stimulation, stress, and other circumstances deserves a closer inspection. Thus, the next time your dog begins panting when the weather isn’t particularly hot, it does not immediately mean something is wrong; you should always reflect on what it was doing just before it started acting likewise.
By all means, they can become super-excited when they hear someone uttering the word “walk”, or maybe someone is at the door as the doorbell rings. Similarly, when they have just finished racing around the rooms, and they have discovered something new in the garden, each of these events can lead them to pant heavily.
Final words
When you learn the dog’s individual pattern, it makes it convenient to spot the difference between their normal behavior and when something is off. Then again, at times that seemingly mysterious panting can be interpreted as their way of communicating, “A lot is happening right now. When you have covered all the points that make your dog pant, you can take proper care of it, and without making any assumptions, you can offer it the appropriate support as and when needed.