Why Do Dogs Pant?

Dogs pant for two reasons: to expel heat--it’s how they perspire-- and to relax. One reason why dogs pant is that they get rid of a lot of stress when they pant. In fact, if you are with a dog who is tense, an old-time trick we’ve been using for a hundred years is to just start running that critter down the street and within a half a block, almost every dog in the world will start panting because they build up internal heat real quick.

They’ll start panting to get rid of that heat and the baby goes out with the bath water—along with all the heat goes a lot of the stress and uptightedness. So you manage to get rid of a lot of stress in the dog by taking advantage of a mandatory physiological response in the dog. So dogs need to pant to get rid of heat and at the same time they are releasing stress.

Keep this in mind if you ever consider putting a muzzle on your dog--your dog can't pant and cool himself if he has a muzzle on.

by Dr. Dennis Fetko, "Dr. Dog"
http://www.DrDogsBehaviorSolutions.com