Dogs in Boats!

We love our dogs and want to have them with us as much as possible, but when boating we all have to take extra safety precautions. There are endless varieties of boats, dogs and environments, and you will have to take into account your own dogs' needs for your conditions.

We are in Florida, and Harley and Lily go out with us in a small boat in the St. Johns river and marshlands. We have to watch out for things like alligators and snakes, especially with Lily because she loves to go swimming - anywhere! The water is often too dark to see into clearly and we are always worried about her being grabbed by an alligator.

We keep leashes on Harley and Lily when they are in the boat so that if they fall out we have something to grab to pull them back in. Lily has been known to jump overboard to go swimming, but Harley is not a water-dog! Having been around Lily all his life he is used to being wet and running through puddles, but he does not willingly go swimming.

Oh, but he has gone swimming! After a tropical storm we took a ride into an area that had a lot of shady trees. Fallen leaves had made a thick covering on the ground, but when the storm waters came the area flooded and the leaves floated up to the surface of the water. It looked like solid ground and Harley jumped right out of the boat and disappeared from sight!

There was about 4 ft. of water under a couple of inches of floating, dead, slimy, partially decomposed leaves. <<< Roll over the photo of Harley to see the muck where he went in!

He bobbed right back up, and having the leash handy we were able to pull him back to the boat, but he was one swampy looking mess!

Harley did not learn his lesson. A few weeks later we were on the Sweetwater canal and pulled over to sit for a bit. This time the "ground" looked green with lots of floating duckweed, and again, Harley went in with barely a splash.

The duckweed closed over top of him as he plunged into the cold water, and we were glad his leash was there for us to pull him back to the boat. He was not a happy dog for a while, especially since I had to dunk him again just to rinse most of the duckweed off. That was one pitiful looking puppy we fished out of the river! I dried him off in my hoodie and once he warmed up he was fine.

Harley and the Duckweed.
Harley looked pitiful covered in duckweed and shivering with the cold, but he dried out quickly.

Dogs in Life Vests

Since Harley had already shown that he was likely to fall in the water, and Lily won't stay out of the water at all, we decided that to go kayaking they needed life vests. I purchased Harley's long before I actually got our kayak, and would put it on him...