no KENNEL SECRETS. 



attached, and which as a rule he treats with greater consid- 

 eration and better judgment than he does himself; and if 

 he fails with them he generally does so through ignorance. 

 Narrowing the subject to the drinking water of dogs, it 

 is hard to believe that they are often intentionally neg- 

 lected, but it is easier to believe that the absurdity noted 

 in the beginning is largely accountable for such familiar 

 practices as supplying dogs with water but once or twice 

 a day even during the hottest weather, and in old wooden 

 pails that have seen months and months of service and 

 are thickly coated with slime, like the " old oaken bucket " 

 of which the poet — who was evidently ignorant of even 

 the first principles of hygiene — has so fondly told. 



A glance at the physiology of animals shows that nearly 

 three-fourths of the bodies of all consist of water and that 

 they part with a large amount of it constantly by the 

 lungs, skin and other avenues. Consequently in order 

 that health may be maintained there must be a constant 

 renewal of this simple but highly important fluid, and it 

 must be good and wholesome. 



Water may be all this when placed before a dog but if 

 cannot long remain so in the air of a kennel or yard where 

 there is more or less decaying vegetable and animal food 

 •and other filth, for it soon absorbs these baneful exhalations 

 and actually becomes to a certain degree poisonous. 

 Furthermore, when so exposed and stagnant it frequently 

 takes up germs of disease, many of which float easily on 

 the air. And if the pail or other vessel in which it stands 

 is lined with slimy accumulations it is very evident that 

 it must soon become tainted from this source if from no 

 other. 



As a matter of fact, because they are denied sufficient 

 good, wholesome drinking water is one of the pronounced 

 reasons why dogs kept chained or otherwise closely con- 



