What's Normal for a Dog, Cat, Horse, Sheep or Rabbit

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Quick Facts

A dog's normal temperature is 37.5 to 39.2°C (99.5 to 102.5°F), not the 101 to 102.5°F most sites repeat. A cat is 38.1 to 39.2°C (100.5 to 102.5°F), a horse 37.2 to 38.3°C (99 to 101°F), and a rabbit runs hotter. Numbers help. Knowing the animal helps more.

Before the numbers, the honest version. Caro and I have spent a lot of time around a lot of different animals, and that time has taught us to notice when something is off. We have caught things early because of it. We are not vets, though, and noticing is not the same as diagnosing. If something feels wrong, ringing a vet is the best thing you can do, and it is worth the cost. It might be nothing, and you have spent a consultation fee. It might be something, and you have saved a life.

On a house sit that cost should fall on the homeowner rather than on you, which is why it is worth confirming before the sit starts whether their vet can bill their card directly in an emergency. We go through that properly below.

The whole process, from the first application to the handover, is in our book Travel More for Less. This page is a reference to keep, not a story to read once.

For most of Europe we point sitters at TrustedHouseSitters first. For the wider safety picture, our house sitting safety guide is the place to start.

What Is a Normal Temperature for a Dog?

Start here, because this is the number most people arrive looking for, and most of the internet gives it to them wrong.

A dog's normal temperature is 37.5 to 39.2°C (99.5 to 102.5°F). The range you will see repeated on pet blogs, 38.3 to 39.2°C (101 to 102.5°F), is not the whole picture. The floor sits a degree and a half lower than that, and the wider figure comes from the veterinary reference the profession actually uses, which takes its values from Dukes' Physiology of Domestic Animals.

Why does that matter on a sit? Because a sitter who reads 38.1°C (100.5°F), remembers "101 to 102.5", and rings an emergency vet at midnight has been misled by a blog. A dog at 38.1°C is normal. That is the entire argument for knowing the real range rather than a number somebody repeated.

For a cat it is 38.1 to 39.2°C (100.5 to 102.5°F). For a horse it is 37.2 to 38.3°C (99 to 101°F). A rabbit is the outlier, at 38.6 to 40.1°C (101.5 to 104.2°F), which surprises almost everyone. A rabbit running a temperature that would be a serious fever in a dog is simply a rabbit being a rabbit.

This is also why everything on this page is a range rather than a number. Veterinary references disagree at the margins, sometimes by more than a degree, and breed, age, time of day and the weather all move the figure. Our figures come from the MSD Veterinary Manual, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension and university veterinary references, and even those do not fully agree with each other. Treat them as a way to orient yourself, and check the specific figure for the specific breed when it matters.

The Numbers, Species by Species

These are the animals a sitter is most likely to be left with, including the smallholding ones. Heart rate and breathing are resting values, taken when the animal is calm and has not just been walked, handled or frightened by you.

The heart rates are the part people find hardest to believe. A guinea pig at 380 beats a minute sounds like a medical emergency and is simply a guinea pig. A rabbit's heart runs roughly four times faster than a large dog's, so a sitter who checks it against what they know about dogs will conclude the rabbit is in crisis. It is not. This is the single best argument for reading the numbers for the species in front of you rather than reasoning from the animal you know best.

If you are sitting the smaller ones, our guide to rabbits, guinea pigs and small pets covers the day to day, and farm animals covers the larger ones including horses and goats.

Why a Stranger Taking the Reading Gets the Wrong Number

Here is the caveat that matters more than any figure above, and it comes from the same livestock reference as the numbers. Animals that are not used to being handled can show elevated heart and breathing rates purely because they are being handled. You are a stranger in their space, holding them, with equipment they have never seen.

In practice that means the more nervous the animal, the less useful your measurement is. A calm labrador will give you a fair reading. A rabbit who has never been picked up by anyone but their owner will give you a number that says crisis and means "put me down". The same reference notes that warm, humid conditions push temperatures up as well, so a hot afternoon can move the figure without anything being wrong. If you are sitting through a hot spell, house sitting in a heatwave covers what heat does to animals specifically.

I have never taken a pet's temperature on a sit and would not expect to. Most sitters will not, and most owners have never thought about it either. It is not on the list of things anyone packs. So treat the numbers as something to know rather than something to do. The reading only helps if you know what that individual animal looks like when it is well.

What Sitters Actually Notice

After a while you can simply see whether an animal is doing well. That is not a gift, it is familiarity, and it usually takes a couple of days on a sit to build. Once you have it, the things that stand out are obvious rather than subtle.

The animal stops eating. It stops drinking, which is more concerning than most people realise because it moves faster. It is limping, which tells you something is wrong with a foot or a leg and is usually either an injury or pain somewhere. There is diarrhoea, or vomiting, or the litter tray and the garden tell a different story than they did yesterday. It is visibly in pain, holding itself oddly, or making a sound it does not normally make. Or it is simply not itself, hiding when it is usually sociable, or clingy when it is usually independent.

None of those require a thermometer. They require you having spent enough time with the animal to know the difference between today and yesterday. That is the whole skill, and it is why the first day of a sit matters so much. Our guide to unusual behaviour on a sit goes through what the various changes tend to mean, and a pet that has stopped eating is its own whole subject. If the animal is older and the changes are gradual rather than sudden, caring for a senior pet is the better page.

When Something Feels Off, Call the Vet

The judgement call is not "what is the diagnosis", because that is not yours to make. It is "is this different enough to spend a phone call on". On that question, call. A vet line, an out of hours practice, or the 24-hour helpline your platform provides will tell you whether to come in, and that is the only opinion that counts.

If the animal is genuinely unwell and needs seeing, you may have to pay up front and claim it back. That is how several platforms work, and it is worth knowing before it happens rather than discovering it in a waiting room. Our guide to who pays for vet care on a sit goes through the full mechanics, including what the platform terms actually require and how the reimbursement process works.

The short version, and the thing worth doing before every sit: ask whether the owner's vet has a card on file and whether the practice will treat the animal on the owner's account. If the answer is yes, the whole problem disappears. If the answer is no, you know what you are taking on, and you can decide whether you are willing to front it. It is also worth asking what the owner wants if the answer is expensive, because that conversation is much easier at the kitchen table than it is at two in the morning.

Most of this belongs in the questions you ask before you accept a sit, which is what our pre-sit question guide and the house sit checklist are for. It is also worth knowing how your own position changes when the animal is not your own, which whether a sitter needs insurance sets out honestly. And if it turns out to be you who is unwell rather than the animal, being ill on a sit is a separate problem with its own answers.

If you are facing something urgent right now rather than reading for later, what to do when the owner is unreachable is the page you want, and recognising an emergency covers the signs that cannot wait.

What Normal Looks Like, Animal by Animal

Ranges are useful. A picture of the animal on a good day is more useful. Here is what to establish early on each of the species you are most likely to be left with. The smallholding birds are their own case, covered in chickens and ducks.

Dogs

Normal is a dog that comes to the bowl, wants the walk it normally wants, and moves the way it moved yesterday. Dogs are honest about pain in obvious ways: they limp, they go quiet, they stop wanting to climb the stairs, or they stand with a hunched back. A dog that is panting at rest, in a cool room, with no reason to be, is the one to take seriously. If you have a deep-chested breed, the bloat signs are worth knowing before the sit rather than during it. The day to day is in looking after dogs during a sit.

Cats

Cats are the opposite of honest. A cat in pain hides, goes still, stops grooming, or stops using the litter tray, and it will often do all of that in a room you are not in. The reliable signals are appetite, litter tray use, and whether the cat comes to you the way it normally does. A cat that has stopped eating for a day is a genuine concern, and a male cat straining in the litter tray with nothing coming out is an emergency. Our guide to sitting for cats covers the rest.

Horses

Horses are the one animal here where a sitter should expect to be told exactly what to look for, and should not accept a sit without it. Normal is 37.2 to 38.3°C (99 to 101°F), with a heart rate between 23 and 70 and around 12 breaths a minute. Gut sounds matter more than most people realise, and a horse that is off its feed, rolling, or pawing at its belly is a colic risk and needs a vet rather than observation. Only take a horse sit with real experience behind you, and our farm animal guide is blunt about why.

Sheep

A sheep sits between 38.3 and 39.9°C (100.9 and 103.8°F), hotter than a dog or a cat, and a fully fleeced animal on a hot day can run higher still without anything being wrong. What you are watching for is a sheep that has separated itself from the flock, because that is the sheep equivalent of a cat hiding. Sheep are prey animals and they hide illness until they cannot, so a sheep lying away from the others, not coming to feed, or moving stiffly is further along than it looks.

Rabbits

A rabbit is 38.6 to 40.1°C (101.5 to 104.2°F), with a heart rate that can exceed 300 beats a minute, and both of those are normal. What is not normal is a rabbit that has stopped eating, because a rabbit that stops eating goes downhill fast and can be in real trouble within a day. Gut stasis is the thing to know about. A rabbit sitting hunched, grinding its teeth, or producing smaller droppings than usual is a rabbit that needs a vet, not a wait.

Guinea pigs

Guinea pigs run 37.2 to 39.5°C (98.9 to 103.1°F), with a heart rate up to 380 a minute, which is genuinely remarkable and worth knowing before you decide something is wrong. Like rabbits, they hide illness, and like rabbits, a guinea pig that stops eating is the alarm. They are also social animals who do badly alone, so one that has gone quiet and still is more concerning than one that is vocal. Our small pets guide covers the handling and housing side, and if medication is involved then giving a pet medication is the practical companion.

Conclusion

The number matters less than knowing the animal, but the number is still worth having, and the one most people have is wrong. A dog is 37.5 to 39.2°C (99.5 to 102.5°F). A cat is 38.1 to 39.2°C (100.5 to 102.5°F). A horse is 37.2 to 38.3°C (99 to 101°F). A rabbit is hotter than all of them. Get the range right and you will not panic at a normal reading.

The rest is familiarity. Spend the first day learning what the animal does when it is well, eat with it, walk with it, watch the litter tray. After that, spotting that something has changed takes seconds, and you will not need a thermometer to know it is time to ring somebody.

And when you do ring, remember that the point is not to have the answer. It is to have somebody qualified tell you it is nothing, or tell you to come in. Either way you have done the job properly. And if you are a homeowner reading this rather than a sitter, what to look for in a sitter is the other side of the same coin.

Caro and I have completed 20 house sits across 12 countries, driven 19,000km across Europe in our 1998 VW T4, and saved over $26,500 in accommodation costs over three years of house sitting.

DM us @housesittersguide, we answer everyone.

Frequently Asked Questions

• What is a normal temperature for a dog?

  99.5 to 102.5°F, or 37.5 to 39.2°C. That comes from the reference the veterinary profession uses, which takes its figures from Dukes' Physiology of Domestic Animals. The narrower 101 to 102.5 range you see repeated elsewhere has a floor that is a degree and a half too high.

• Why do most websites say 101 to 102.5?

  It is a simplification that got copied. 101 to 102.5°F is roughly the middle of the real range, so it is not dangerous as a guide, but it is incomplete. A sitter who panics at a perfectly normal 100.5°F has been let down by a repeated number rather than by the animal.

• What is a normal temperature for a cat?

  100.5 to 102.5°F. Cats sit in a narrower band than dogs, which is why a cat running a genuine fever is often easier to spot once you know the animal's normal behaviour.

• Should I take a pet's temperature on a house sit?

  Probably not, and most sitters never will. The reading is only useful if you know that individual animal's baseline, and handling by a stranger raises both heart rate and breathing. Noticing that the animal has changed is far more useful than a number.

• Which animal on this list runs the hottest?

  A rabbit, at 101.5 to 104.2°F. That would be a serious fever in a dog and is simply normal for a rabbit. Guinea pigs are close behind, and their heart rate can reach 380 beats a minute.

• When should I call a vet rather than keep watching?

  If it is different from yesterday, call. Not eating, not drinking, limping, diarrhoea, hiding, or behaving unlike itself all justify a phone call. A 24-hour vet line will tell you whether to come in, and that is the opinion that counts.

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