Extreme cold - dog pottying outside help

[Sparkles99]

Please help us! I don't know what to do. I've put Muttluks & a coat on her, but she's had one each #1 & #2 all day. She tries to take the Muttluks off or shelters against snowbanks or plunks her butt down & looks resigned to die. If perchance she gets a Muttluk off, she'll pick up that paw off the ground. It's so cold out it burns.

It's -39C (-38.2F) with the windchill & dampness factors. It's the first real cold snap we've had and it's not supposed to break for a while.

What should I do? Thank you in advance!

 

[Pixiebeak]

you can put a square of artificial grass down in the garage abd see if she will use thst. Or try putting thst outside on top of snow to use.

Or get a bag of sand and dump on a patch of snow and see if she will use that.

 

[flyzipper]

Shorten the walks to the bare essentials (potty) and try different boots if the current set is annoying her.

Pepper needed boots when it got below -10C so we wore them starting at -5C, but we had normal walks during that time (we both tolerated those temps with suitable attire).

Below -20C (and definitely -40C) would be a trip out and in as soon as she did her business -- Pepper seemed to learn very quickly that the sooner she did her thing, the sooner we'd return inside. My suspicion is that your girl is digging in her heels ("plunks her butt down") because she's worried there's an insufferable walk in front of her, rather than just a quick potty and back inside to the warmth.

Don't feel guilty about denying walks for a few days while this arctic air mass passes.

 

[Toy]

Years ago we had major arctic cold & one of my dogs went down within a minute of putting her out. I had to run out & rescue her. Since then I've trained all my dogs to run out, do business, & run back inside.

Only thing I can suggest is try spreading newspaper in your bathroom & let her in there for a bit with the door closed. If you have puppy pads use those.

You can also try putting a thin coating of Vaseline on her paws to take her out & wipe them off when you bring her in. They do make "Paw Balm" & "Musher's Secret" for dogs.

 

[Sparkles99]

Thank you; I’m going to investigate these ideas, especially the stuff for the paws.

We went out to the back stairs tonight. She reluctantly did her business, then I scooped her up & ran inside. It’s sheltered on three sides so there was less wind.

 

[Pixiebeak]

You csn get the artificial grass snd tray dog potty combo for around 40 on Amazon.
Check this out! https://a.co/d/1N7pIw4
There are different sizes. Measure it out to be sure yiu get a size tgst works for you

 

[Xoetix]

Poor baby!

My two boys, Sherlock and Watson, had this issue when we were in Michigan for the one winter we survived there - it hit -45F and our southern butts thought for sure we were going to die.

The kitchen of the house we were renting was linoleum, so we put down puppy pads down everywhere in the kitchen. I think Sherlock still managed to hold his poop for a couple days though, it was miserable.

 

[Kassiani]

Growing up in northern Illinois, our dogs would behave exactly as you describe your pup. Just as @flyzipper described, they learned to do their business quickly so that everyone could get back inside ASAP. We would shovel paths in the snow and a little circular patch in the backyard for them to do their business. The snow 'walls' actually helped keep the wind away from them--which helped. None of them liked the booties, but they tolerated coats. Oh, and we had dachshunds.