What Are The Worms In Your Dog’S Water Bowl?
Small worms in dogs’ water bowls usually come from the environment, but sometimes they are on your pet and when they lick their fur, they spread it to everything else they touch with their muzzle, water bowl included.
Outdoor water bowls are especially at risk because they can attract all kinds of worms, which love the water because it’s slippery and still contains enough oxygen for them to live in.
You can find different kinds of tiny worms in dogs’ water bowl, they’re not all the same and some might be more harmful than others.
Are Worms In My Dog Water Bowl Normal?
If you own a dog as your pet, you have to give it water every day in its water bowl so that it can quench its thirst. But, has it ever happened that you forgot to change the water for a few days?
In such cases, the water remains stagnant for quite a few days. You also might have noticed black, thread-like tiny things floating on the water’s surface. You might have wandered about these small creatures.
Well, these are worms that grow on the water’s surface or in other kinds of stagnant water bodies. So the chances of the worms coming from the environment are much higher than the dog’s body.
The only time worms come from a dog’s body is when the dog remains outside for a long period of time and carries unwanted worms from the environment. Then, the worms and other unwanted organisms get attached with furry coats.
Dogs often have the habit of licking their paws and body. Therefore, these worms get transferred to their mouths. Later, when they sip water from their bowl, these worms fall into the bowl.
Black Worms in Dog’s Water Bowl
Mosquitoes may be the culprit if you’ve found black worms in your dog’s water bowl: In their larval stage, mosquitos live in water and look like stringy black or dark brown worms. It is worth noting, though, that they appear darker when present in a lighter-colored dish—such as a white plastic or stainless-steel bowl—than when seen in a darker-colored dish, which can make them appear gray or taupe.
When these larvae become pupae, they take on a more curled-up form. In both stages, though, these developing mosquitoes are fairly small and may look like dark, stringy worms in the water.
Larval mosquitoes do not drink blood to live; as such, they do not pose the same sort of risk to humans and pets as adult mosquitoes. If your dog drank water infested with mosquito larvae, the bacteria in the standing water containing the mosquito larvae would pose a greater risk to the dog’s health than the bugs.
On the other hand, adult mosquitoes can pose a huge risk to the health of both dogs and humans, including through the transmission of heartworm. To become a carrier of heartworm, an adult mosquito needs to consume a heartworm-infected animal’s blood. The infected mosquito may then pass the heartworm to the next animal it bites.
Adult mosquitoes are most likely to be found in locations that were hospitable to their early development. Thus, it is not a good idea to allow developing mosquitoes to proliferate in your dog’s water bowl.
4 Common Types of Worms in Dog Poop
If you found worms in your dog’s water bowl, the good news is that they don’t come from your pet but from the environment.
Keep in mind that this doesn’t mean that you have worms rampaging in your house because many worms target only stagnant water.
Having worms in your dog’s water is certainly an unpleasant experience, but most of the time your dog will be fine or may experience mild symptoms like diarrhea.