Ernie Ward, 'America's pet advocate', on P.E.I. for veterinary conference

The man dubbed America's pet advocate is on Prince Edward Island, reminding pet owners about the dangers of extreme temperatures, careless tethering and obesity.

"Anything I can do to get the message out about how to take better care of animals, I'm going to use it," Dr. Ernie Ward told CBC's Island Morning Thursday.

Ward, who was the recurring house veterinarian on Rachael Ray for several years, is on the Island for the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association's annual convention.

On top of his television appearances, Ward is also well known on social media. His 2012 video where he purposefully suffers inside a hot car to show the danger to animals has more than two million views.

Ward said he madethe video for local advocacy and was pleased it went viral. Some people have asked him why he didn't do a more rigorous scientific test, but Ward told Island Morning host Matt Rainnie that wasn't the point.

"I was just looking at the emotions," he said. "I wanted to see what it felt like to be trapped in a car like a dog, and that was really the genesis of the experiment, not to try to do some scientific treatise, just to simply go, wow, this really is frightening."

Shunning hot and cold

Ward also posted aYouTube video earlier this year where he suffered throughthe opposite extreme: a winter's night in a doghouse.

"There are this misperceptions that somehow [a dog's]fur coat heats them magically, that their body heat can somehow warm up a doghouse," he said. "None of those I found to be true. As I've told everyone, listen, if you don'tbelieve that video then do it yourself and prove me wrong."

Ward spends his time in the doghouse wearing high-qualitycold-weather gear. "Let me tell you, it didn't help very much after the first two or three hours."

Thoughtless tethering

In a similar vein, Ward argued that people shouldn't neglect their dog in theyard simply because they're on a tether.

"We're not saying you can't put your dog on a tether outside," he said. "But we are saying if it's 90degreesFahrenheit [32 C]and 100 per cent humidity, you can't do that for 12 hours."

None of these issues is the deadliest one for pets, however. Ward says the biggest issue for pet owners in both Canada and the U.S. is animal obesity.

• Montreal woman guilty of animal cruelty after dog left in sweltering hot car dies

Wardfounded the Association for Pet Obesity Prevention in 2005 and co-authored the American Animal Hospital Association's weight management guidelines in 2014.

"Table scraps are a big part of it, but honestly it's just the caloric density of foods and treats," he said. "Today's treats pack more calories per can or cup than ever before and it's easy to overfeed."

The solution is the same as it is for humans, Ward said: see a doctor (a vet in this case), watch the animal's calories and make sure it gets lots of exercise.

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