Dehydrated - A 5 Minute Freewrite

When we first picked up the pup we rescued through January he was dehydrated and starving. He is an arctic dog and they aren't allowed to come inside or else it "breaks them" and they whine and they don't want to be outside all the time. Now, that may seem cruel to you and I, but these dogs are built for it. These aren't your European cocker spaniels or german shepherds. These are traditional Inuit Sled Dogs that trace their lineage back to being one of the true North American breeds alongside their counterpart, the Chihuahua.

Snow was about 2 months old when we got him at the local store. Some kids were tossing him in the air so I scooped him up and my wife got mad at them. Being a teacher, it scared them away. But the important part of the story I got sidetracked on is that he didn't know what a water dish was at first. He would snap at the water and hit it, so it took our big 1 year old Chocolate Lab, Millie, drinking from the bowl to show him what it was. The first time he tried to lap from the bowl, he shoved his face in deep and pulled back, gasping in surprise. It was quite adorable.

5 Min

Later on, we discovered that the arctic dogs get the majority of their water by simply eating snow. They have evolved to generate enough body heat to deal with the extreme cold of the north. For us, eating snow is highly not recommended in a survival situation due to the amount of calories required to heat up the frozen water into a liquid form your body can utilize. But not for them.

One notable thing about Snow that I miss is his adorable white eyelashes. That and his woo-woo attitude. He was very talkative and loved to tell you off for not feeding him fast enough or playing long enough.