OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) – We all know dogs are sloppy drinkers — heck, my labs seem to slop more water out of the bowl than they consume … but believe it or not, there is science to a lot of pet habits.
Water and dog drinking
You give him a pristine bowl full of cool freshness, only to have it become sudsy with drool after his first drink of the day. What is up with sloppy, soggy dog drinking?
This is not bad etiquette. The mess is due to the structure of their mouths and the incredible force of their tongues.
Apparently, dogs’ and cats’ cheeks are ‘incomplete,’ so instead of being able to use suction against gravity to move fluid, they do it by lapping. Not only that — dogs plunge their tongues into water, curl their tongues backward and then withdraw them quickly. You try to do that without making a mess!…