The question showed up recently on 14ers.com and, according to the International Society of Mountain Medicine, based in Ridgway Colorado, the answer is yes.
Dogs can at least become afflicted with acute mountain sickness (AMS). A dog with AMS "goes off its feed, becomes listless, doesn't want to do much," signs very similar to those exhibited by humans, according to the societies president, Dr. Peter Hackett. One indicator that he pointed to was tongue color. The tongues of afflicted dogs, much like humans, would become "mildly dusky." The dogs all responded well to returning to lower elevations.
Cats are smart enough to not let their owners take them anywhere in the first place, so they are generally safe.Dogs can at least become afflicted with acute mountain sickness (AMS). A dog with AMS "goes off its feed, becomes listless, doesn't want to do much," signs very similar to those exhibited by humans, according to the societies president, Dr. Peter Hackett. One indicator that he pointed to was tongue color. The tongues of afflicted dogs, much like humans, would become "mildly dusky." The dogs all responded well to returning to lower elevations.
For more on how to handle AMS in dogs, click here.
7 comments:
Stands to reason though my 14er climbing dog never showed any symptoms during his career. BTW, the correct spelling for that Colorado town is Ridgway not Ridgeway.
We came from 1877 ft altitude to 9200 in one day. The next morning our small dog had chills, extreme weakness, wouldn't eat or drink. By afternoon we gave him water by an eyedropper. Finally by evening he began to eat a little and took a little water. The next day he was recovering and two days later is fine. He had been at low altitude for five weeks. It must have been altigude sickness.
Our older dogs were restless, could not settle, panted excessively and puked up everything they were fed. Our oldest dog (13) had to sit up at night and had respiratory stridor. We were camped at over 10,000ft. in the Medicine Bow NF in MT. They were both fine when we returned to under 9,000ft.
Hi Dave Philipps!
It's incredible how similar are humans and dogs illness. I take advantage of this information
xD
I took my dogs up mt. evans (over 14,000') in the jeep. At the top we walked around to enjoy the view, and the dogs were whimpering and whining the whole time. I assume they had altitude sickness, as I was feeling the effects as well.
I just recently came aware that dogs can suffer from altitude sickness, especially puppies, when we went to visit friends, yes,the whole family including the puppies, they showed symptoms in a matter of a few hours, we of course wern't sure what was wrong, one died, then a few hours later another, and we realized it must have something to do with the elevation, and quickly returned home, to be nursing another that would have surely died if we stayed. It is real, don't take little breed dogs up to high elevations, a very sad lesson.
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