Dogs - breathing

[Bhen69]

If i cover a dogs mouth will it breathe through its nose or will it pass out or possibly die?
Just intrigued not sure i should try it out on Rusty just to find out!

[bobclean]

Please don't hurt your dog bhen, if you want to know if your dog can breathe through it's nose, just watch it whilst it is sleeping, of course it can!

[Clanad]

As bob says, dogs normally breathe through their noses... they "pant" and breathe through their mouth primarily to cool their tongue which is their only method of cooling their blood as it circulates through the body. Dogs have no other means of cooling themselves unless they have water available to swim or wade in...

[Peter Pedant]

Just like you they can close off there mouth from their nose and breathe through that.

They do when chewing or gnawing and so on.

One of my dogs likes carrying things in its mouth, socks, tins etc and breathing through its nose,and it all sounds a bit weird, as she wanders around the house, wagging her tail and snorting loudly [not cocaine I hasten to add]

[Sphinx_Svens]

try it and get bitten ... how long could you suffer that treatment before you fought back? .. huh

[Peter Pedant]

I thought of you BHen when a friend who is a plastic surgeon started discussing whether children who have cleft palates, easy to breathe through mouth and nose,have to learn again how to do it, after the operation.

The discussion ranged through crocodiles and hippopotami - who have to close the off the moth when they are eating under water, and have nostirls that kinda stick up

and quite alot of 'we dont undetand what you are disucssing' from by standers