Ok, so we have two yellow labs. One we raised from a puppy and one that we adopted from a rescue. The one we adopted was 7 years old at the time and had been surrendered due to a divorce. At the time of surrender he suffered some serious separation anxiety, we knew about that. What we did not know, until new years eve, was that he is scared to death of fireworks and thunder. Well this summer in the southeast has been awful for him. The first stage starts when he senses the weather is about to change and begins trembling. Second stage is when he goes to the garage door and barks and scratches the door, his old owner said that she used to take him for car rides when it would get bad. If we are not here, he has done this twice, he will damage the trim around the door (I have replaced it twice this year).
So here is what we have tried so far; melatonin in his morning meal and his dinner which seemed to take just a little bit of the edge off, not enough though he is still destructive when a storm rolls through (also heat thunder). Our current vet has also perscribed valium for him (1-2 10mg tablets as needed). The only problem with this is that both my wife and I work so we are not always able to rush home and give him his valium in time. Also I am not a big fan of medicating. Anyway it would appear that the valium worked for the first few storms but it would seem that he is building a tolerance. We also tried putting him in a kennel when we are gone but he scratches and claws at the door to the kennel until his paws are raw and occasionally bleeding.
I think it’s all about acclimating him to noise. Start with buying a box of the little throw type firecrackers. The type where a small amount of gunpower is wrapped up in a white paper. Start by throwing these at your dogs’ feet. Then slowly progress up to some blackcat firecracker. After that, maybe get one of the Roman Candles and point it at the dogs, then some bottle rockets.
Civillatri is onto it. If you get time, pick up a copy of “Don’t shoot the dog.” Pretty basic book that lays out kinda why animals and humans do the things they do. In short, you definitally need to acclimate the dog to noise, and if you can, pair it with positive things for the dog, (ie, food when the dog is hungry, etc.)
Let me know if you have any questions or want more specific advice.
(I’m not a vet, by the way. I’m working on my degree in behavioral psychology.)
There is a new product on the market called a DAP diffuser - most vets have it, and pet stores may, too. DAP stands for Dog Appeasing Pheromone, and, for some reason, it tends to calm dogs down and make them more comfortable. It is a diffuser that you plug into a wall outlet much like a plug-in air freshener, and you should install it into the room where your dog spends most of his time. If you have a large home and the dog is not crated, you should buy several and place them in different rooms. I have been able to take several of my storm-phobic patients off antianxiety meds after using the diffuser.
If that doesn’t work, there is an anxiolytic called alprazolam (Xanax) that works better than Valium for some phobic dogs.
Both my black lab and golden retreiver are/were terrified of thunder. The lab I got from the pound at one year of age but the retriever I had as a seven week old puppy. Whenever it thundered both dogs cowered.
As a kid one of my Welsh Corgi’s (we had three) was terrified of fire crackers, automobiles backfiring, thunder, etc. Had the phobia all his lfe but it never bothered the others.
Thanks for the help. I forgot to mention we already tried the DAP system, it didn’t seem to do anything. I will ask about Xanax when “Oz” goes in for his yearly check-up next Saturday.
We were giving our dog Valium for anxiety issues. They didn’t work so we increased the dosage. This happened a few times before we figured out the problem. Turns out the dog was hiding the valium under his tongue until we looked the other way, then he spit them out and sold them to the other dogs.
Thanks. Sorry to hear about that, although I must say that I got good laugh over your dog’s ingenuity. I actually put the valium in some peanut butter. It seems to take about 30-40 minutes and he starts to mellow out some. It almost seems like it takes just a little of the edge off, if I had to guess I would say that “Oz’s” level of anxiety is about a 10 (on scale from 1-10). With the valium he seems to come down to about a 7 or 8. Thanks again for the laugh and the suggestion to make sure he is taking the meds.
I’d be intersted in your progress and if you have any success.
In essence we had a Great Pyreness that had the exact same behavior. Tried some behavior modification and several medications to no avail.
The behavior kept getting worse. One day during a fairly severe thunder storm that happened when we weren’t at home, the dog jumped thru a closed second story window, apparently trying to escape the noise. Although she appeared to be fine the veterinarian discovered she had several interanal injuries and we were forced to put her down.
Although we’ll likely not get another dog, I’ve always wondered if there was something else we could have done.
First let me say how sorry I am for your loss, I can only image how tough that was.
I will absolutely give you an update as we proceed. So far the behaviour mod type stuff has been to no avail. Basically, Oz can tell the difference between a CD generated storm and the real thing. We are pretty sure that is because he “senses” the change in atmosphic pressure and his behaviour starts to change a good 30 minutes or more before the storm actually shows up. The only thing we cannot figure out is how Oz can tell the difference between fireworks and the pnuematic nail gun sounds (we live in a new development), the only thing I can figure is that he can tell that the fireworks happen in the dark and the nail gun pops happen in the light. Any way I will absolutely update everyone as we either make progress or not.
I’ve had this same issue with my lab/chow mix. She’s twelve and this cropped up a few years ago and has steadily gotten worse. Recently she’s taken to closing open doors with her nose when the storms crop up but I’m not sure what she’s trying to accomplish. She shut herself into the bathroom last week while I was at work and tore the door and trim to pieces as well as cut herself up pretty good. Blood all over the floor and everything.
I’m a bit reluctant to try any of the acclimation therapies at her advanced age and I dislike the idea of drugs. I haven’t tried the DAP method so I’ll give that a shot. If anyone has any other ideas I’ll certainly listen.
I can only say find someone to help that probably specializes in the area. Nothing our vet suggested, including drugs, worked. The problem continued to worsen as she aged. This of course resulted in some significant damage whenever the dog was left alone, either to her or to her surroundings.
So it has been a couple of months since I originally posted about Oz’s anxiety. Well, Oz has been on doggy Prozac and Melatonin for last two months and we have noticed a significant improvement in his ability to relax. Specifically, last Friday the local high school (about 2 miles up the road) celebrated homecoming with a massive fireworks display. Normally this would have sent Oz over the edge, his reaction this time was to lift his head off the floor at the first sign of noise and then to lay back down. This is huge, normally I am anti-drugs but this has clearly changed my mind and Oz is much better off for it.
Thanks to everyone that posted and pm’d me. Hope you appreciate the update.
