Is It Too Cold to Walk the Dog?
It’s so cold here that many of us humans get hurt. What about dogs? Is it safe to put rubber boots on Norman and take him for a walk? Dr. Kim Smith, a staff veterinarian with Petplan, gets these questions every winter, so she created a spreadsheet based on the Tufts University rating scale . It’s simple: Just find the outside temperature, factor in the wind and cold, how cold it really feels, and then look at your dog’s size. Green means it’s safe to go outside, yellow means you must be careful, orange is dangerous and red is potentially life-threatening.
Smith talked about the diagram on WBUR here and now , explaining that there are some caveats – for example, the mountain dog in Alaska is accustomed to the cold, whereas the common dachshund that wakes up in a warm bed in the city is probably not. Although, as a rule, she says: “At temperatures below 30 degrees, taking into account the cold, any dog will be unsafe to be outside for a long period of time.”
Here is the diagram: