We have our water softened mainly to get the iron out. We use it for everything except drinking or making coffee. Is it healthy for our dogs to drink softened water?

Sure it is. Hard water is the water that is not so good to drink, because it has more impurities. Your dog will get plenty of minerals from their food. The mineral content of water will be much less significant.

Joanne, although your post is indeed about the nutrition of your dog, I have moved it from the Nutrition board over to the Dogs board. We have a wonderful dog expert here, Labman, who will get to you when he comes on line.

He will see your question on the Dogs board, but would be unlikely to answer it on the Nutrition board as that board is geared more to us bipeds. ;)

We have our water softened mainly to get the iron out. We use it for everything except drinking or making coffee. Is it healthy for our dogs to drink softened water?

Hard water is in about 85% of the households in the U.S. Hard water has a migh mineral content, with high levels of metal ions, calcium and magnesuim.
Soft water has a low mineral content, (low PH), some add sodium replacing calcium and magnesuim, and some processes don't add sodium, but even this reduces hardness. It really all depends on you, a lot of people use softened water for laundy and baths, etc but have separate lines for drinking. I have a lot of friends with soft water and it seems to have no ill effects on their pets.;)

Softened water does have more sodium, but hardly enough to make any difference. The only thing I ever heard on water quality was that iron in the water can cause the tear staining in light colored dogs. Even that came from somebody I didn't trust fully. So give you dog softened or unsoftened water, which ever you find the easiest.

Softened water does have more sodium, but hardly enough to make any difference. The only thing I ever heard on water quality was that iron in the water can cause the tear staining in light colored dogs. Even that came from somebody I didn't trust fully. So give you dog softened or unsoftened water, which ever you find the easiest.

''Soft water has a low mineral content, (low PH),''

This is wrong. Softened water still has minerals in it, just sodium and chloride in place of other metals and carbonates. There are reverse osmosis and deionizers, but they are seldom found in whole house systems.

This is wrong. Softened water still has minerals in it, just sodium and chloride in place of other metals and carbonates. There are reverse osmosis and deionizers, but they are seldom found in whole house systems.