Dogs Vs. Torus Water Bowl

You may not have heard of Torus yet. They are debuting a fairly new water bowl that refills itself with filtered water. It’s meant to be difficult to tip over and has a locking mechanism to secure the water when you travel, making it an option for vacationing fur kids. Hyrex sent me the Hyrex Torus Ultimate Pet Water Bowl to try out and share my thoughts.

Personally, I’ve always given my dogs filtered water anyway for a number of reasons. As VetInfo.com says, “Tap water is marginally accepted as a source of water for dogs but is generally not recommended. If you know the exact number of total dissolved solids in your tap water, you may choose to use it. Water containing less than 5000 parts per million of total dissolved solids is considered acceptable for pets. 7000 parts per million is considered unacceptable for livestock.> Tap water may pose other risks if it is high in iron, magnesium, or nitrates. All untreated water can harbor parasites, viruses, and bacteria.” Personally, the more I learned about tap water, the less I wanted to give it to any member of my family and that’s why we are a filtered-water only household.

I’ve generally served up filtered water in stainless steel or ceramic bowls for my dogs but when I tried the Torus for a few days, I noticed something happened.

Setup

The bowl arrived quickly from Amazon and when I first opened it, I thought it was nice looking, appeared well-made, and I set out to read the instructions. There is a knob on the bowl that allows you to select whether you’re filling the bowl, want to lock it (for keeping the water secure in the chamber if you’re traveling), or want water to flow freely (the setting it’s normally on for everyday use).

Before filling it, I noticed the water filter (pictured below) that came with the bowl had an oily-feeling residue to it, so I rinsed it off first. The instructions are pretty straightforward. There’s not really any assembly required other than putting the filter into the water chamber which takes all of 1 second. Then, to fill the bowl, you simply pour water into the chamber until it’s level with the top of the water filter. Pretty simple.

From there, you insert the knob (over the filter) and I twisted it to the “locked” setting so I could take the bowl over my dogs’ drinking spot. When I turned the knob to the “flow” setting, water streamed freely into the bowl. Once it was filled to a certain level (about 1/2″), it stopped filling and that was that. There are no batteries and no electrical chord, gravity just helps it refill when necessary.

I dumped out the first couple bowls of water that it filled just to be sure the system was flushed before my dogs started drinking from it. It didn’t say anything about this in the instructions, but I’m the overprotective type when it comes to my fur kids.

About The Testers

One of my dogs, Archie, has always been a water guzzler. I have to slow him down to prevent him from chugging too much water at once so for him, it was a plus that the water level wasn’t very high. It helped slow him down and he hasn’t had any reservations drinking from it.

My other dog, Sage, has always needed encouragement to drink. She was the first to try the Torus and I was surprised by her reaction. I had noticed she was sometimes tentative when drinking from the stainless steel bowls when the tags on her collar would clang against it (she’s a short dachshund mix so she’s right at bowl level), but that didn’t seem to happen with the Torus. I don’t think I have ever seen her drink so much before!

The Verdict

I came in with an open mind and thought we would try it and let the dogs decide. I have to say I will be continuing to use this bowl for my dogs. I don’t know if it was an intended feature for it to moderate water consumption for heavy drinkers, but that’s been a very good side effect for us. The dog who drank too much slowed down, and the dog who drank too little drinks more and they had already been drinking filtered water before this!

I like that it’s made from food-grade materials and it’s BPA free too. Big pluses for me.

Both my dogs are on the smaller side (both under 20 lbs) so the only con I could see may be for bigger dogs. I’m generally a fan of elevated feeders for large breed dogs and while I can see the benefits mess-wise of keeping this bowl low profile, it may be nice to have an elevated option for bigger dogs to make drinking easier on their bodies.

Overall, the dogs are happy and I’m happy. The Torus is here to stay in our home.

If you’re interested in finding out more about this bowl, check it out here on Amazon.