Change

How well does your dog adjust to change? I'm sure you all know of a human or two that doesn't like change but what about our dogs. We had a big party on Saturday night and of course the weather forecast was saying that there was a chance or rain. Being that the party was going to be an indoor/outdoor one we put up an e-z up and covered our large trellis with a tarp.

I had the dogs outside all day so that they would be good and tired for the party; they'd be in our room while it was going on. They watched the goings on during the preparations; the girls didn't flinch the entire day. Luke on the other hand did and does not like the e-z up or especially the tarp.

First; we call Luke, Luke skywatcher. Each time he has a seizure and comes out of it he is constantly checking the skys for whatever got him. He doesn't know where the seizures come from but watching his behavior he thinks it comes from the skys. So when the wind kicked up and the tarp was flapping he shot in the house like a bullet. Seeing this I kicked into my "behavior modification" mode.

Calling Luke out I set to puttering. Luke was on constant alert to the flapping tarp but I kept him close. I chattered to him about all the things we were doing; talked about the bad dog barking behind our house and just general day to day stuff. He is a good listener; weird actually because he's a guy. ;)

Anyhow, he soon relaxed and each time the wind would flap the tarp I would make sure to do nothing. Our dogs watch us so closely to see our reaction and if they consider us to be the leader; they follow our lead. The girls made a couple of glances to the new sky covers but weren't worried about them.

Change can difficult for anyone but more so for dogs. We can't tell them what is going on or give them a heads up to impending changes so it happens all in the moment for them. Watching them watch us gives us a clue as to how to calm them with our own behavior.