well one of the most popular beaches in Central Florida is now open to the dogs and with man's best friend roaming the sands at now at Cocoa Beach pet owners should be aware of a dog's time spent actually in the water yes and a couple weeks ago unfortunately a University of South Florida student says his dog died after his trip to a Florida beach and the cause something we don't hear a lot about salt water poisoning to get a better understanding of this we brought in dr. Tamera downs from Orange County Animal Services thank you so much for being with us this morning and I have to admit I hadn't heard of this until people started talking about it on social media what exactly is saltwater poisoning yeah so saltwater poisoning are saltwater toxicity whichever way you want to call it it's basically what it sounds like so a dog is in the you know playing in the water maybe you brought tennis balls because you've got a very you know ambitious guy who wants to play fetch and through all of that they're ingesting a lot of saltwater whether they want to or because they're thirsty or just because that balls in their mouth and it's soaked and then that will cause an over ingestion of salt and so the body should only have so much sodium in it and after a period of time it can cause symptoms so it'll pull water out of their body cause dehydration it can also cause diarrhea that can get as bad as bloody diarrhea and then of course if we ignore it for too long and don't attend to them in time it can cause seizures and even death oh well so when we talk about kind of things that we have to look for look looks to see if if our dog is suffering from that what are some of the symptoms so the first one I would look for classically would be diarrhea and that would be something that you would see shortly after going to the beach maybe we didn't have enough water we didn't think about it because we were having too much fun at the beach and we didn't think about offering enough water at that time a dog that is really thirsty might be another symptom too and obviously if they they might feel often so they might just be a little lethargic so not acting quite as playful as they did when they were out there under the Sun are they more prone to this type of poisoning than than we are I think it's more an awareness issue difference because we all know that we need to bring plenty of water to the beach and we're constantly pushing that idea that we need to take care of ourselves and we're at the beach and I think it's more just that we we don't think about it as much for our dogs because they're super resilient they're so happy we're just not thinking about it because we're having too much fun so I think it's just more more equally susceptible but we're just not as aware but now when we were talking during the break you mentioned that that's an issue but also you taking your dog to the beach you see a lot of sand impaction so that's something else people should be worried about yeah so and and oftentimes it's not something you're gonna see them eating sand I'm sure a lot of owners if they were to see their dogs trying to shovel backs and they'd stop them but it's often incidental so think about those tennis balls once again they're soaked in sand they're putting them in their mouths accidentally ingesting it and then it can become a very serious very deadly issue that needs surgery and I have participated in those surgeries before and they take a long time and they're very stressful on the dog so it's it's a very high-risk it's a situation that escalates are faster than the salt water does and do certain are certain breeds more susceptible to salt water or even sand impaction um I don't I don't believe so I think it's more just the personality of your dog so once again if they're ready to be in the you know in the water and they just want to stay in the water and they don't wanna get out of the water they're probably gonna be a little more susceptible than your dog who just wants to sit under the umbrella with you and just wants to hog your water the whole day so mm-hmm so the main things that we need to remember just to limit the time and make sure they have a lot of water yes yeah so bring some extra water for your pets bring some extra water for your dogs and do take breaks as well I'm be aware that even though they're having fun the the dogs aren't necessarily going to feel the side-effects until later so we have to be their advocates to intervene before that happens and once you notice these symptoms in your dog you need to act quickly of course so the first thing you should do is find a veterinarian and go seek help because they're they're gonna be the ones who are gonna tell you at what stage they're at how serious it is and if this is something where they can just help you with rehydrating the animal and sending it back home or if it's more serious than we need to consider more serious options like hospitalization all right don't dance thank you so much so the doggies don't need to be at the beach all day will happen I don't know if it's not relevant to you certainly come out to Orange County services and pick yourself up a furry beach friend we do take in about sixty animals a day and we're running is special for teachers they get the dogs were free I'm starting in the month of August and everyone else is 15 bucks and I've been watching them all day when I work there and they are super super sweet those teachers they need some support this time yes thank you no problem
