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BioPhysicist
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I started writing this question on pet.SE but realised after a while that I think it has more to do with physics than pets but if some admin disagrees, please move it back to pets.

I have heard several people claim that their dog's (we are talking about breeds such as spitz') thick fur isolate against heat in the summer and trimming it would actually make the dog worse off (that is, having bigger problems with the heat).

The context here are summers in Northern Europe so it is rare that the temperature in the shadow is above 25 °C.

Is this really possible? A dog's normal body temperature is around 38 °C and my intuition says that as long as the ambient air temperature is colder than the body temperature the dog will lose heat. With a thick fur, that heat loss is slow and inefficient while if the dog was "naked" it would lose heat much faster.

Are there any properties of a fur that makes my intuition wrong?

Of course, shaving a dog might cause other problems, such as their skin not being adapted for being exposed to direct sun light, bugs and ticks might be a bigger problem and in playing with other dogs the fur protects against sharp teeth or claws but these are separate issues.

I started writing this question on pet.SE but realised after a while that I think it has more to do with physics than pets but if some admin disagrees, please move it back to pets.

I have heard several people claim that their dog's (we are talking about breeds such as spitz') thick fur isolate against heat in the summer and trimming it would actually make the dog worse off (that is, having bigger problems with the heat).

The context here are summers in Northern Europe so it is rare that the temperature in the shadow is above 25 °C.

Is this really possible? A dog's normal body temperature is around 38 °C and my intuition says that as long as the ambient air temperature is colder than the body temperature the dog will lose heat. With a thick fur, that heat loss is slow and inefficient while if the dog was "naked" it would lose heat much faster.

Are there any properties of a fur that makes my intuition wrong?

Of course, shaving a dog might cause other problems, such as their skin not being adapted for being exposed to direct sun light, bugs and ticks might be a bigger problem and in playing with other dogs the fur protects against sharp teeth or claws but these are separate issues.

I started writing this question on pet.SE but realised after a while that I think it has more to do with physics than pets but if some admin disagrees, please move it back to pets.

I have heard several people claim that their dog's (we are talking about breeds such as spitz') thick fur isolate against heat in the summer and trimming it would actually make the dog worse off (that is, having bigger problems with the heat).

The context here are summers in Northern Europe so it is rare that the temperature in the shadow is above 25 °C.

Is this really possible? A dog's normal body temperature is around 38 °C and my intuition says that as long as the ambient air temperature is colder than the body temperature the dog will lose heat. With a thick fur, that heat loss is slow and inefficient while if the dog was "naked" it would lose heat much faster.

Are there any properties of a fur that makes my intuition wrong?

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Can thick fur isolate against heat?

I started writing this question on pet.SE but realised after a while that I think it has more to do with physics than pets but if some admin disagrees, please move it back to pets.

I have heard several people claim that their dog's (we are talking about breeds such as spitz') thick fur isolate against heat in the summer and trimming it would actually make the dog worse off (that is, having bigger problems with the heat).

The context here are summers in Northern Europe so it is rare that the temperature in the shadow is above 25 °C.

Is this really possible? A dog's normal body temperature is around 38 °C and my intuition says that as long as the ambient air temperature is colder than the body temperature the dog will lose heat. With a thick fur, that heat loss is slow and inefficient while if the dog was "naked" it would lose heat much faster.

Are there any properties of a fur that makes my intuition wrong?

Of course, shaving a dog might cause other problems, such as their skin not being adapted for being exposed to direct sun light, bugs and ticks might be a bigger problem and in playing with other dogs the fur protects against sharp teeth or claws but these are separate issues.