The sweat one is the only place I'll disagree. Hair actually makes sweating way less efficient. It's one of the leading theories as to why humans are relatively hairless - so we can sweat more efficiently. You can actually work a LOT harder in hot conditions than any monkey/ape without dying of heat stroke. In fact you can actually "chase" most animals to death in hot weather. Some of the higher monkeys in Africa literally chase antelopes to death, and eat them once they collapse from heat exhaustion.
People have learned this lesson the hard way with pets for many years. Your dog will just die on a hot day if you don't provide more shade and water than you need, because they just can't dump heat effectively.
People have learned this lesson the hard way with pets for many years. Your dog will just die on a hot day if you don't provide more shade and water than you need, because they just can't dump heat effectively.
I thought dogs didn't sweat. Maybe that's why, because it would be so ineffective with fur.
Basically, yes. Dogs have glands that produce oils and all sorts of stuff, but do not produce or use sweat for cooling, and being fully covered in fur you are correct that it would be mostly useless.
There are technically 3 types of sweat gland, and only one type is generally useful for cooling (there are always exceptions in biology).
Milk-producing glands (mammaries) are actually highly modified sweat glands!
the function is the opposite, it is to retain heat. not only from covering and density (more in the groin and underarms) but also when the arrector pili muscles in the skin activate in response to cold all over the body (producing heat from contraction) and raise the hairs to point straight up off the skin (goosebumps), which minimizes air flow over the skin, and helps trap the released body heat between the hairs.
(post is archived)