What Causes Tremors in Dogs Legs?
Before you assume that your dog has a debilitating chronic problem, bear in mind that tremors can occur for a variety of reasons, not all of which present cause for alarm.
Cold weather, for instance, can cause your dog to shiver. Electrolyte imbalances can also cause shivering or trembling; fortunately, these imbalances usually respond to rehydration and/or nutritional therapy. Toxin ingestion may also cause neurological irregularities that result in tremors.
Shaking or quivering in your dog’s rear legs may stem from pain caused by degenerative joint problems. For instance, osteoarthritis (a common condition in dogs as well as humans) causes pain when the cartilage between bone ends starts to deteriorate, allowing for bone-on-bone friction. If your dog experiences such chronic pain in his rear legs, he may exhibit tremors when he tries to stand or walk.
Hip dysplasia is another painful condition afflicting the rear legs. In this condition, malformed hip joints become unstable, contributing to joint damage, chronic pain, and resulting in shaky legs and tremors when the dog tries to use the afflicted joints.
Chronic tremors that tend to grow worse over time may indicate a neurological disorder. One such problem, degenerative myelopathy, is especially prevalent in German Shepherd Dogs, Collies, Siberian Huskies, and crosses of these breeds. however, it can also affect a wide range of other breeds such as:
Degenerative myelopathy involves a progressive thinning of the protective myelin sheath that provides insulation for painal nerves. This degeneration typically causes hind leg weakness and tremors, first in one rear leg, then in the other (it does not affect the front legs).
Thankfully, this condition does not cause pain. However, it makes some dogs so unstable that even a slight push from a standing position might knock them over, at which point they might find it exceptionally hard to get back up again.
Diagnostic Techniques and Procedures
If your dog suffers from shaky or trembling rear legs, your veterinarian can run various tests and diagnostic procedures to determine the underlying cause. Joint problems will most likely appear on X-rays, while analysis of laboratory samples can detect toxins, electrolyte imbalances, or metabolic problems such as hypoglycemia.
Your vet may also schedule a CT scan or MRI. Neurological problems won’t usually show up on routine lab tests. If your vet suspects this kind of problem, your pet may need his cerebrospinal fluid evaluated.
Why Do Dogs Twitch in Their Sleep?
Dogs sleep an average of 12-14 hours each day. While they sleep, a dog’s brain processes information and experiences from the day through dreams. Twitching is often related to active dream cycles in the brain.
According to research by psychologist Stanley Coren, an average-size dog will dream about every 20 minutes, and these dreams will last about a minute. Larger breeds have fewer dreams that last longer—about every 45 minutes for 4 minutes. The opposite is true for smaller breed dogs; they will dream about every 10 minutes for up to 30 seconds.
Dogs experience the same dream stages as humans, including non-rapid eye movement (NREM), short-wave sleep (SWS), and rapid eye movement (REM). During the REM state, a dog’s eyes move around behind their closed eyelids, and the large body muscles are turned off so the dream is not physically acted out.
The part of the brain that contains these off switches is called the pons, which is part of the brain stem. In younger dogs, the pons may still be developing, while in older dogs it may be weakening from age. This is why twitching while sleeping occurs most commonly in younger and older dogs and less often in adult dogs.
The amount of twitching depends on how much these off switches inhibit muscle movement. Puppies spend more time in dream sleep than adult dogs because they need to process more information.
Dogs that sleep in a curled position will keep their muscles tensed and are less relaxed, which may cause them to twitch less than a dog that sleeps in a stretched-out position. Any outside stimulation from loud noises such as thunder, fireworks, or strange voices may partially awaken a sleeping dog and result in twitching as well.
How to treat a dogs legs from tremors/shaking/trembling naturally.
You may have noticed sudden, brief twitching at some point while your dog was sleeping and wondered if they were dreaming or even expressing some type of discomfort.
These involuntary movements—where a dog is twitching in their sleep—only occur during dream states and usually don’t last long. Twitching can happen anywhere in your dog’s body but commonly occurs in the legs, tail, or head. It may be accompanied by small vocalizations.
So is twitching just a normal part of dreaming, or are there times when you should worry?