Is Your Dog Shedding? 5 Reasons Your Dog's Hair May Be Coming Out

(c) Louise Lambert

By Debbie Davis

A dog's coat is one of the first things we often notice, and fall in love with. When this coat starts to leave hair on furniture, floor, and in the air it can lose a lot of its charm. Here are 5 reasons your dog may be shedding its coat.



Light
If you run your fingers through your dog's coat, you will find that there is a thick undercoat beneath what you see when you just look at your pet. How long this coat remains is determined by the length of the days.

So in the winter months when the days are shorter, their coat remains mostly intact because shorter days mean less sunlight which generally equals colder weather---a time when your pooch needs its fur to insulate it from the cold.

As the length of days increases, this triggers shedding of the undercoat. Isn't it awesome how animals' bodies are programmed to react in this way?

Temperature
If your dog is an outside dog, its undercoat will remain intact until warmer temperatures trigger shedding. If your dog is an inside dog, the comparatively mild temperatures year round may cause your dog to shed year round (good news right?). The upside is that your pooch may not develop as thick an undercoat as it would normally because temperature remains moderate.

Illness
Just as in humans, illness can cause a lot of natural body functions to go out of whack. So many more dogs seem to be affected by cancer which can certainly cause shedding; and the chemotherapy used to battle this disease often causes shedding.

Stress
This can result from physical and emotional issues. Examples of physical stressors include being left in a crate for too long, hunger, thirst, infection, surgery, lack of sleep, pain.
Emotional stressors include fear (thunderstorms, car rides, meeting people and or other dogs, fireworks), separation anxiety, depression, and lack of companionship.

If these situations occur on a regular basis, it's easy to see how this can affect the overall health of your pet. Doing all you can to help your dog avoid these situations can reduce shedding.

Scratching
Continuous scratching will take hair out in a fast and furious way. Many times this behavior happens because of allergies. They can be triggered by diet, or because of something with which your dog has physical contact.

For instance, if your dog is allergic to wool, and the rugs on your floor are wool, laying on them is enough to keep your dog continually itchy. Allergies can also result from allergens that are inhaled. So itching may be more pronounced at a certain time of the year.

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Take the dog hair and dander out of your air and reduce the amount on furniture and floors. See the Pet Dander Air Purifier from PurerAir.com at http://purerair.com/pet_dander_air_purifier.html

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