Dogs In Trucks

how exciting!  trucks and dogs!

All dogs love going for a car ride.  Well, most of them, anyway.  My dogs go crazy when I pick up my keys and they aren't asked to go to their kennel.

**caution: graphic photos**

About a month ago, I was driving home from visiting family.  It was a 17 hour drive, and for some reason I was hyperaware of the deceased animals on the side of the road.  During the 10 total daylight hours, I saw 7 dogs, two partial deer, a coyote, 2 armadillos, and a cat.  This was not including all of the corpses that were too smashed to identify.  My heart broke with each pet I saw.  And it got me thinking, 'what happened to all of these animals?'  I came up with a couple of ideas.  Either they were strays, or they were untethered in vehicles.

raw paws

There isn't a whole lot I can do about the strays except mourn their final moments.  I have no idea if they relished being homeless or not, and all I know for certain is that they met their demise on a major interstate highway three lanes across on the southbound side.  I don't know if they suffered or not, but they were certainly deceased.

ouch.

As far as the untethered dogs go, this seems a wee obscene.  As an emergency vet tech, I have seen what happens when dogs and cars meet in an unfortunate way.  Everything from scraped paws from being dragged a short distance, to broken bones and avulsed flesh.  One dog I encountered had approximately 80% of his flesh torn from his muscles.  All that remained intact was his face, tail, and the distal portions of his legs.  He had fallen from a bed and been run over.  He did not make it.

It just seems like it should be common sense to secure a dog in the car as you would a child or adult.  And if the dog is in the bed of a truck, secure the dog so s/he cannot jump or fall out.  Kennels and tethers would prevent all of this from happening.  And there are so many ways to create a makeshift leash for your pet in the truck bed....

if you own a truck, you should be able to do this.

And it isn't only truck beds!  You may think your dog is safe inside the body of your car, but you roll the window down because your dog likes to stick his head out.  No different from the dog being in the bed of a truck.  The dog can jump or fall out, same as a bed.  Roll the windows up, or put your dog in a seat belt.

Sometimes, as a veterinary professional in the emergency specialty, I wonder about the sanity and the common sense that the general public has.  I understand that many people feel this way about others, and so I presume I will continue to wonder about people.  I just think that if my child has to be secure, so should my dog.  If a dog likes to chase squirrels, I shouldn't let my dog get in a situation where s/he can run into traffic if s/he sees a squirrel.  And if I am going 75 mph on an interstate highway, I need to be sure my dog or child doesn't somehow end up outside of the truck bed by accident.