Dogs and Fireworks

The Fourth of July is just around the corner. How well does your dog do with loud fireworks? My three JRTs don’t seem to mind them as long as we are with them, and we have people in our neighborhood who spend money on the big ones. However, I used to have a Shih Tzu that was really bothered by all the noise.

How well does your dog handle the holiday commotion, and do you make any special preparations to get your dog through it?

My dogs will be terrified. On the Fourth I expect my Rottie to be hiding in the bathroom and the Bordeaux will be under my desk (where she usually is).

I’m anxious to try the D.A.P. samples that I got to see how they work for the dogs. If the samples seem to help, they may be helpful to ease the stress of our upcoming move. I can spray it on their bedding in the back of the truck and hopefully it will help them relax.

Too bad it doesn’t work on people.

You know, I bet dog appeasing pheramones (DAP) could help. The scent is supposed to be very soothing to dogs, like they were back with their mom. What I’m wondering is whether people really can’t smell the product. You’ll have to let me know when you try it. Fireworks don’t bother my current crew very much, but two of the dogs get very anxious when their teenage buddies leave the house. Now that I think about it, wouldn’t it be wonderful if they could make a product like that to calm down teenagers, lol. 

Although the Fourth of July is a week passed already I wanted to let you know of my experience this year with my little guys. They were absolutely terrified and the noise went on until well after midnight and started before 7. The 2 japanese chins were more afraid than my pug. They were actually shaking when the really loud booms came and there were a lot of them. The only thing we could do was hold them and try to make them feel safe. I also had about 5 cats that didn’t know where to run each time it was really loud. Next year I am defiantly going to try DAP.

Gosh Terry, I wish I had known before the holiday. When the people at D.A.P. sent me samples, one was a collar but it was just small. It would probably fit your dogs. It would have only helped one but you could have seen how it did. My dogs are way to big; it would have been like an ankle bracelet for them :D I could have sent you the collar to try on one of your guys.

I didn’t really get a chance to test my samples. Amazingly, the neighbors didn’t shoot off any fireworks and the ones at the beach were too far away for the dogs to notice. I’m fairly certain I slept through the whole thing because I don’t remember hearing anything at my house. I think the kids went up to the main road to watch (way too crowded to go to the beach). So I can’t tell you how it did. However, I still plan to use it on the bedding when we move. Anything to help them relax will be important. It’s going to be very stressful on all of us.

Oh Terry, I’m sorry to hear that. In addition to using DAP a try, I’d recommend keeping the shades drawn and turning up the TV or stereo to help deaded the booms a bit. Also, it may help to act a bit more nonchalant about your pets’ anxiety. With dogs, comforting and cuddling them when they are afraid often reinforces their notion that there is something to fear. My own first reaction is to cuddle and reassure, but I know that my dogs will respond to my own emotions, so if I feel anxious, it gets transferred to them. I just try to stay calm like whatever’s going on is no big deal. Most of the time that works.

As for my own household, I can safely say that fireworks do not seem to bother my three Jack Russells. Our neighborhood had the loudest celebration ever, and that is really saying something based on years past. We’d normally have to go to the city celebration downtown to see anything similar. These were big, loud and still going on around 3:00 a.m. The girls didn’t seem nervous over the booming. Of course, Sophie is deaf, but she can feel vibrations and she does react to however the other dogs feel. Guess we were lucky.

This is a timely topic to say the least! 

Terry, I’m also sorry that you had that experience.  It’s so sad when they get scared, but I think Kelly is right about trying not to transfer your feelings over.  Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that when I got them years ago, so I also tended to hug them when they were scared. I stopped doing that about two years ago, and it really does help them to act “cool” and not pay attention to loud noise.  It’s funny, but they are very similar to babies that way; they take their cues from the adults around them to see how to react.

My husky howls and barks when she hears the fireworks. We tell her to shush but that just makes her howl at us :-) It’s so funny, you can’t help but laugh. The little one just runs to the window and watches, but she takes her cue from the big one, so if Pharrah starts, Misha starts to “talk” too.  Those two are quite a duo!