Before you can recognize illness, you need to know what healthy looks like for your dog specifically. Every dog has a baseline, and the better you know it, the faster you'll catch a problem.
Baseline Vitals & Habits to Know
-
Temperature: Normal body temperature for dogs is 101–102.5°F
-
Heart rate: 60–140 beats per minute depending on size (smaller dogs have faster rates)
-
Respiratory rate: 15–30 breaths per minute at rest
-
Appetite: How enthusiastically they eat, how much, and how fast
-
Energy level: How active they are, how long they play, how quickly they tire
-
Bathroom habits: How often they urinate and defecate, what their stool normally looks like
-
Weight: Weigh regularly, even a 1–2 lb change in a small dog is significant
-
Sleep: How much they sleep and where
-
Behavior: Their typical personality, social, independent, vocal, cuddly
Key Principle: You don't need to memorize numbers. You just need to pay attention consistently, so that a change registers. The earlier a problem is noticed, the better the outcome.