When driving a car or playing sports or video games, hand-eye coordination is one the biggest keys to success. I also now know that the need for such a combination of timing and accuracy is also very important when it comes to getting your dog to pee on a two-inch piece of paper.

No, this is not some desperate attempt to fill the void of a missing Playstation that was sold out of necessity due to a bad economy, I need my dog Casper to pee on this strip of paper in order to test the pH level in his urine.

Last year, after noticing Casper was having trouble peeing (as in, he lifted his leg but nothing was coming out), we took him to the vet. Turns out he had something called struvite crystals in his urine due to low acid levels in his pee.

In other words, bad things were going on inside of the little guy’s pee pee, and we wanted to make sure these bad things never came back.

We recently came across a pH Home Test Kit from the Solid Gold company. For about five bucks, you can get a bottle of 100 strips. Basically, when your dog is getting ready to pee, you just stick on of the strips in the pee stream (best of luck trying to get more of the urine on the strip then on your fingers).

Once the strip is wet, wait 30 seconds. Then compare the color of the strip to the various pH color codes found on the little code sheet that comes with the kit. You’ll then have an idea of your dog’s current pH level.

Luckily, Casper is right where he should be at about 6.5. We plan on testing him every other week just to make sure all is well “down below.”

This kit is awesome. If your dog has any sort of urinary tract issues, (or you just really want to see your dog’s pee make a piece of paper turn different colors) definitely pick one of these up.