My 2-year old choc lab has lately been wanting water all of the time -- and I mean ALL of the time. As soon as I fill up his bowl, he slurps it down and then wants more. Of course, this means he needs to be taken outside twice as much as he used to, which is turning into quite a cycle. Does anyone know what this could mean? Is it something I should take him to the vet for? If so, what could it be?

Could be for many reasons but diabetes is what springs to mind. This behaviour is not normal to your dog, a prompt visit to the vet seems advisable. Hope all is OK.
Sandy

Sandy is right, the unquenchable thirst is one of the classic symptons if Diabetes. A visit to the vets sounds in order.....Good Luck:)

liberty

Is your dog on complete food as this makes them drink quite a bit?
Lel

Excessive thirst can be due to a lot of things, is he on dry food if so he will need more water than if he was on tinned, does he drink a lot after excercise or is it constant? If it is then i suggest a visit to the vet so he can check there isnt anything wrong like diabetes, liver disease or kidney problems, hopefully it will be something simple but a visit to the vet won't do any harm :)

by the time i'd typed all that on my above post you all had posted already, sorry guys if some of our advice is the same, great minds eh :D

Would like to add that if you feed complete food water should be available all the time, my hounds have 2 buckets down and full all the time. Tined food is 70% water any way and fresh falls between the 2. But if in any doubt have the dog checked out by the vet, urgently if this has only just started and is something new.

Would also suggest taking a sample of his urine to the vet with you as well so they can check it. A urine infection is another thing that can cause excessive thirst.

Christine, Spain.

Thank you everyone for the advice. Yes, he is on complete (dry) food, so I try to always make sure he has water. He has always tended to slurp it down as soon as he's finished eating and then shown no real interest in it, so I usually just give him water at periodic intervals during the day. But I think I will take him to the vet this week just to make sure. Does anyone know of other symptoms there would be if it was Diabetes? He seems perfectly healthy otherwise - his energy level is through the roof!

Is he peeing more than usual?

I'm not sure if he's peeing more than usual, or if it's just because he's drinking more than usual. When I take him for a walk around the block, he usually stops around three times, but that could just be him "marking" his place. Then again, he's neutered, so do they still do that?

hi

my dog had a similar problem suddenly started drinking lots of water but when he peed only a small amount came out but was going all the time ,any way he became very dehydrated and had to go into the veterinary hospital way they did tests and was found to have high calcium levels in his blood he deteriated very quickly we have never found out to this day what was wrong with him after having biopsy on his prostate gland which came back clear he had a complete body scan they found nothing eventually the calcium was causing kidney damage i don't need to tell you the end of the story ! there was 2 weeks from the beginning of the illness to the end ,sorry i probably should'nt be telling you this cos i don't what to alarm you but just so's you know it best to take him to the vets quickly its probably something of nothing but you don't want him to become dehydrated if he's drinking and peeing it out!

Wow, I'm so sorry to hear your story -- if you don't mind me asking, how old was your dog? I'm definitely going to take him to the vet this week (it's a holiday today, so I'll have to wait until tomorrow to call). It's hard for me to think that he might be sick because he's acting perfectly fine otherwise. But, as everyone has pointed out, it's better to be safe than sorry.

It's funny, but today he hasn't really wanted any extra water at all. . . !

hi

my dog was only 6 years old,glad to hear your problem seems to be going away thats briliant!