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Swimming, does your dog like it?


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Just like the title says, how does your dog feel about swimming?

 

My border collie apparently loves it! Before yesterday he would go and swim willingly if I threw a toy or stick or anything else, but yesterday he went swimming just to go swimming. He swam in a few circles and just was paddling around with a big goofy grin on his face! It was super cute. I've never had a dog that loved water that much! My other dog (terrier mix) will swim if asked to, but would prefer not to bother.

 

How does your dogs feel about swimming? Do they love it!? Do they hate it? Do they just think it's ok if there is a toy/stick/something else involved? Only good on hot days?

 

I'm talking about rivers, lakes, ponds, pools, etc. Not bathtime :P

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Torque LOVES swimming at the lap pool at the rehab vet. (We visit about 3-4 times per year). He will go in up to his chest in a river or a pond, but no further even if I throw a toy or stick out past where he can still touch bottom. I think he might be convinced to come swimming if I went in, but I don't trust the water around here. (My friend picked up a nasty parasite from the river by just wading up to her waist - no swallowing of water.)

 

Jovi

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Meg's idea of swimming:

P1220080.jpg

P1220090.jpg

 

Meg is not a very good swimmer (her butt floats and her shoulders sink, leaving her struggling to keep her head above water). She will go in if I do though and loves to play fetch in shallow water. This year, I bought her the Ruffwear Float Coat. We've tried it out once so far. It took her a while to realize she didn't need to work so hard, but once she did, she started to enjoy it a bit.

 

Bear, the old lab mix, LOVES to swim and recently re-discovered how great is feels to be a bit weightless. He has bad hips and arthritis in his back. We've been taking him to a small lake not far from home to go swimming as much as we can so that he can exercise without wearing himself out or making himself sore.

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I have several who swim. Jill (deceased) and Twist are my master swimmers and they will swim just to swim. When Jill was rehabbing from an injured hip, I could take her to the beach and send her in to the water and walk up and down the beach while she willingly swam parallel to me. Twist hasn't had much time at the ocean since she was a pup, but she likes to swim across ponds and just around in them. The others will swim after things or just jump in and play, but they aren't the strong swimmers that Jill was and Twist is. When Jill went to the rehab vet she could swim in the endless pool at the highest current level for a good while. The vet said Jill was the strongest swimmer she'd ever seen.

 

Others, like Kat, will swim but then get distracted by the ripples, start biting at them, which causes a bit of sinking, which results in splashing, which necessitates more biting at the splashes, which only makes the sinking thing worse--well, you get the picture. But she has a ball doing it!

 

J.

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I was thinking the same thing about Meg's water!

 

Dew swims just to swim, she loves it. Mick swims for sticks and such and to cool off but not just to swim.

Faye has gotten in shallow water often but its to cool off or chase another dog. She had her first swim when we drove to AR. The ,Mulberry river. One of the cleanest I've seen in a Long time. She got in deep accidentally, she didn't panic but she didn't do it again either.

My old girl Jazz was a dock diving fool. She loved swimming!

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Sounds like a lot of border collies really enjoy to swim! I never knew they liked water.

 

Juliepoudrier, My bc did the same thing. Splashing up the water and eating the ripples and then splashing more trying to get them creating mroe ripples/splashes to attack lol Bu after a few times he started get the hang of it and ignore the ripples, hopefully that lasts lol

 

 

Meg's idea of swimming:

P1220080.jpg

P1220090.jpg

 

Meg is not a very good swimmer (her butt floats and her shoulders sink, leaving her struggling to keep her head above water). She will go in if I do though and loves to play fetch in shallow water. This year, I bought her the Ruffwear Float Coat. We've tried it out once so far. It took her a while to realize she didn't need to work so hard, but once she did, she started to enjoy it a bit.

 

Bear, the old lab mix, LOVES to swim and recently re-discovered how great is feels to be a bit weightless. He has bad hips and arthritis in his back. We've been taking him to a small lake not far from home to go swimming as much as we can so that he can exercise without wearing himself out or making himself sore.

 

Wow, that made me ROFLMAO! haha! She is super cute!!!!

 

 

I see you are super close to me! Can I ask where did you go the water was that clear!? Or some favorite swimming spots? We have one lake in my town that's not that far, but it's small area and often a lot of people and dogs. So we go when it's rainy or ugly outside, that way we have it to ourselves, or nearly so ;) lol

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These pictures were taken at Priest Lake, ID near Lionhead Campground. Its awesome up there with good swimming spots all around the lake. Dogs must be on leash except when swimming on the State Park side of the lake (east side).

 

Bear Lake County Park on Newport Hwy, Spokane County is where we go most often, especially in the morning when there are little to no other people there. Its small though so I wouldn't go late summer as the water heats up and you have to worry about bacteria. There's a trail that goes all the way around the lake, a small dock, and several stair-access points to the water. The water here is clear too. They don't do much maintenance anymore and restrooms are closed, but there are Honey Buckets. Dog's must be on leash.

 

Lake Coeur d'Alene has some dog friendly areas too....Tubbs Hill for one, though it can get crowded. Sullivan Lake is good for swimming. Sandpoint, ID has an unofficial Dog Beach. There are also many spots along the Spokane River where you can access the water, but use caution. The current can be deceiving.

 

Eloika Lake is full of weeds to get tangled in so we don't go there anymore.

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These pictures were taken at Priest Lake, ID near Lionhead Campground. Its awesome up there with good swimming spots all around the lake. Dogs must be on leash except when swimming on the State Park side of the lake (east side).

 

Bear Lake County Park on Newport Hwy, Spokane County is where we go most often, especially in the morning when there are little to no other people there. Its small though so I wouldn't go late summer as the water heats up and you have to worry about bacteria. There's a trail that goes all the way around the lake, a small dock, and several stair-access points to the water. The water here is clear too. They don't do much maintenance anymore and restrooms are closed, but there are Honey Buckets. Dog's must be on leash.

 

Lake Coeur d'Alene has some dog friendly areas too....Tubbs Hill for one, though it can get crowded. Sullivan Lake is good for swimming. Sandpoint, ID has an unofficial Dog Beach. There are also many spots along the Spokane River where you can access the water, but use caution. The current can be deceiving.

 

Eloika Lake is full of weeds to get tangled in so we don't go there anymore.

 

Thanks for all the great suggestions! My boyfriend is originally fro this area so he's already warned against the rivers. I probably wouldn't dare take the chance, Talon isn't a super strong swimmer yet. :P

 

At the bear lake one in spokane, are those floating docks always there or do they only put them in area's dogs aren't allowed? I ask because our lake has one dog, but it's enclosed with gating. I think Talon would enjoy jumping off and I want to see how he would do ;)

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hobbs loves to swim and can't manage to pass the farm pond without jumping in and paddling around. he has also jumped into the koi pond twice. that was highly discouraged :-). nova will only go in to cool off.

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Our Megan is a swimming fanatic - she will get into water and swim just for the fun of it. The old family farm in NC is on a tidal creek - it's wide and the farm is about a mile upstream from the Albemarle Sound. About five or six years ago, while we were visiting, Megan (followed by young Bute) just took off swimming, Fortunately, she could still hear so we could call her back because the two of them were on a mission (Bute was a little copycat) and who knows how far and where they would have gone. Megan is also the only one who is crazy about ripples and biting the water when it splashes over rocks.

 

Celt swims but only for a purpose, although he is the first of my dogs into the water to cool down if he's hot. Dan only likes the water if he's hot and then he's right in it.

 

They all are over-the-top enthusiastic about fetch games in the water - but Megan is the one who leaps into the water first and even if she has no chance of getting the ball. Celt will only go in and swim for it if he feels he's got a lock on being the one to get the ball. Dan is very competitive and will give it his best shot any time - and, with his long legs and speed, he's often the most likely to make it to the ball when we play in the sound at the Outer Banks. Both he and Celt have much longer legs than Megan and use them to their advantage in that shallow, gradually sloping bottomed water. In a pond or on the creek in NC, Megan's usually the victor with her love for swimming and willingness to get out there fast and first.

 

We need a good pond here, just for the dogs for summer exercise. I keep telling Ed that...

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I used to take Hannah to a canine swim center, but I think she prefers wading in the creek where there are varying water levels. She does not like to get her face wet though, as evidenced by my photo icon. She is doing a second tentative attempt at retrieving a ball. You cannot tell because the creek is 'living water' and therefore crystal clear, but the ball is on the creek bed under water that would cover her muzzle about half way up. I don't think she was in any danger of water toxicity, but apparently she wasn't so sure.

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ArtTalKat,

You'll need to watch that he doesn't ingest too much water with his antics. There is a chance that doing so could cause water intoxication, which can be deadly. I used to live/work near the beach and I had to watch Kat with the salt water (she also likes to bite at the surf) because ingesting salt water can cause problems as well (well before intoxication levels)--blow out diarrhea specifically.... Ponds shouldn't be an issue for salt water though.

 

Around here some of the ponds are covered with watermeal. The dogs swim and come out covered with little green dots.

J.

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My female, Senneca hates to swim -- she'll swim to save her life, but that's about it.

My last foster, Jesse, loved to swim. In the hot weather, she would take breaks between diving off the dock to luxuriate in the water:

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(cellphone crumby photo, sorry.)

 

Another foster, Dee, just loved dock diving too:

P1020508_zps6b625ff1.jpg

 

P1020532_zps27b9b423.jpg

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So far, mine have all been swimmers - Flint dove in right away as a puppy! thankfully, I had a long line on him or he would have kept going. All indications are Sport is a swimmer too...at least he liked the puppy pool :)

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I took Emmie for swimming for the first time yesterday. I wouldn't say she loved it. She acted nervous and worried, first she wouldn't go out far enough so she couldn't touch ground, but finally she figured out how to 'dog paddle', sort of (it was more like flailing), but it worked, barely. It looked very funny, though, the whole beach was laughing at her :wub: . Once she got to me, she would put her forepaws on my torso and hindlegs on the lake bottom and just kind of stand there.

 

She's over 1.5 years old and I get the feeling this is the first time she's been in water. The ranch where she used to live is a very dry area (east of the cascades), where I'm west of them, so lots of water here.

 

So, no, Emmie doesn't appear to enjoy swimming. She's willing to do it just to come and be near me when I'm in the water, but she never seemed to really relax with it. I'll try again, because I love to swim.

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There's just one dock that's always there, but it has a railing, so not good for dock jumping unfortunately.

 

Check out Spokane Area Dock Dogs group for ideas on where to give dock jumping a try.

They sadly no longer exist really. Everytime I message them I don't get a response, and from what I heard they can no longer do dock diving events because of problems with the spokane events center and the equistrian group having problems with the water on the dirt. :/

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Fergie would swim in the local pond only if it was a really hot day. She hated the ocean - it moved too much and tasted awful. She did go straight in and have a ball at Little Sebago, in Maine - but it is a large spring-fed lake where you can count the pebbles on the bottom from out in the middle. She did enjoy going to the dam area at Kerr Lake and chase the wavelets and swim for tossed sticks.

 

Dixie feels the same about our local pond. But she loved the ocean on our May trip. The problem was that, on the beach walk when she went out on the long leash and swam with us, she drank, too. Later, she pooped brown water! Try to clean that up on the beach. So we kept her just in the surf for the rest of the week. Have to say that she loved to pee in the surf - a puppy bidet!

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ArtTalKat,

You'll need to watch that he doesn't ingest too much water with his antics. There is a chance that doing so could cause water intoxication, which can be deadly. I used to live/work near the beach and I had to watch Kat with the salt water (she also likes to bite at the surf) because ingesting salt water can cause problems as well (well before intoxication levels)--blow out diarrhea specifically.... Ponds shouldn't be an issue for salt water though.

 

Around here some of the ponds are covered with watermeal. The dogs swim and come out covered with little green dots.

J.

 

 

No worries, he doesn't get to swim for very long as he isn't a super strong swimmer yet. We have to be careful with him because when his body starts giving in to being tired, his mind says "no, keep going! you can do it!" >_< Ergh, but the water biting seems to be lessening. We've been encouraging swimming after us or swimming after a toy and that helps keep his mind focused. I'm just glad he isn't a super obsessive bc ^_^

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All mine have loved to swim, my late Brody would just jump in a swim. My current dog was terrified of the water as puppy, he would scream when Brody went swimming as if he thought something really bad was about to happen. We were patient but persistent that he would be at least comfortable in the water as we live near the sea, and within a year he wasp the strongest swimmer we have had and also just loves to jump in a swim, but chasing a ball or stick is even better.

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How cute! My mutt, Lily, loves the water. She seems to like wading in up to her chest, more than actually swimming. But she will swim if it's deep enough. When we take our boat out, sometimes she leaps off into the water, and that usually ends in her going underwater, but she doesn't seem to mind! It's quite entertaining, really. LOL :)

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Annie started out a horrible swimmer, her butt would sink and she would struggle and splash with her front legs, eventually she figured out how to swim correctly. Belle was a natural and would just float around or stand in shallow water, stick her nose in the water and blow bubbles. Wisp swims and snapps at the ripples she makes so I have to keep her time short so she doesn't take in too much water. Floss enjoys swimming, but is also the creek bank patroller, looking for mice. Meg was scared to go in the water initially, she would study what all the other dogs were doing and decided Wisp was having the most fun, so she just jumped in one day and now its hard to keep her out of the water. I can tell her to go for a swim or jump in and she does her own version of a doggie cannon ball.

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