Storm Phobica

[smooch]

We have a storm in the mountains behind us atm, Rescue remedy, thundershirt and the ear muffs on. Smooch is a lot calmer tonight hiding in Everythingsshiny bedroom but he isn't trembling. Yesterday's storm was right over us. Weather the ear muffs are helping I don't really know. When I first started the RR and TS last summer I thought it was all working but than again we didn't have the noise straight over the top of us. I guess time will tell.

[mantis]

My young BC boy is not at all fazed by noises & the loudest thunder storm...he will just sleep through the lot, thanks to the work his breeder put into her puppies when they were little. But my older BC girl is completely different. The thunder shirt does nothing for her, probably because I think, that instead of being frightened by the storm, she trys to fight it. Best thing for her is to put her in her crate, covered except for the front. She soon settles & goes to sleep :)

The breeder did a good job selecting breeding pairs with sound nerve. Storm phobias and fearful behaviour like this is genetic........such a shame to see so many dogs suffer at the hands of breeders who dismiss phobia as a genetic flaw.

She also played the pups one of those "sound" CD's...so I think they were all pretty much desentisized to all sorts of loud & disturbing noises

I believe genetics is the major problem. I have never owned or bred a storm phobic dog and I don't play noise tapes to them. I just will not breed from anything that is noise phobic before the age of at least 10. Some old dogs do seem to react differently as they age and I think this could be due to hearing loss making the noise sound different. Truly storm phobic dogs react to the drop in atmospheric pressure, long before the storm hits. Some neighbours we had years ago, had a 20 year old cattle dog who spent a lot of time on our front verandah. We never let her in our house but the previous home owners did. She was happy to stay on the verandah unless there was a storm coming when she would dart in the door as soon as it was open and scoot under the bed in the master bedroom. This could be 2 hours before the storm hit and she was always right in predicting a storm.

Before 10, I never bred from my dogs after they were ten.

[dancinbcs]

My young BC boy is not at all fazed by noises & the loudest thunder storm...he will just sleep through the lot, thanks to the work his breeder put into her puppies when they were little. But my older BC girl is completely different. The thunder shirt does nothing for her, probably because I think, that instead of being frightened by the storm, she trys to fight it. Best thing for her is to put her in her crate, covered except for the front. She soon settles & goes to sleep :)

The breeder did a good job selecting breeding pairs with sound nerve. Storm phobias and fearful behaviour like this is genetic........such a shame to see so many dogs suffer at the hands of breeders who dismiss phobia as a genetic flaw.

She also played the pups one of those "sound" CD's...so I think they were all pretty much desentisized to all sorts of loud & disturbing noises

I believe genetics is the major problem. I have never owned or bred a storm phobic dog and I don't play noise tapes to them. I just will not breed from anything that is noise phobic before the age of at least 10. Some old dogs do seem to react differently as they age and I think this could be due to hearing loss making the noise sound different. Truly storm phobic dogs react to the drop in atmospheric pressure, long before the storm hits. Some neighbours we had years ago, had a 20 year old cattle dog who spent a lot of time on our front verandah. We never let her in our house but the previous home owners did. She was happy to stay on the verandah unless there was a storm coming when she would dart in the door as soon as it was open and scoot under the bed in the master bedroom. This could be 2 hours before the storm hit and she was always right in predicting a storm.

Before 10, I never bred from my dogs after they were ten.

Sorry, badly worded. Of course you breed dogs younger than that and do not breed from any that show a storm/noise phobia but if a stud dog developed a reaction around 10 or so, I would still use him. We often use stud dogs up to 12 or 13 and occasionally 14 years in Borders. I am also reluctant to use progeny of a seriously phobic dog.

[bianca.a]

Molly is over the top anxious in general now and storms are the final straw She has been on Prozac for nearly 3 weeks and it is helping. Usually I have to dose her with Xanax during storms but tonight I didn't give her anything and while she was stressed, she was much better.

P.S I did not head straight for medicines either, we have tried so many natural therapies first.

Medication should not be considered a "last resort". It's not a failure of yours if your dog is helped by medication more than behavioural modification or training. For dogs who react in a big way to storms, risking injury to themselves and destruction to property, or if they are hysterical and can't settle down at all, medication may be the best thing you can do for them. I urge people to break away from this idea that medication is a last resort and consider instead how bad your dog is feeling when there is a thunderstorm. Is it acceptable for your dog to feel that way? Would you change it if they didn't have to feel that way? Medication may well mean that they don't have to go through that every time there is a storm. It's worth investigating in some cases IMO.

Not picking no you, bianca.a. I'm glad you got your dog on medication and I can guess what a huge decision that was for you. There IS a stigma attached to it and I think that is wrong. Those of us who love our dogs are unlikely to be using medication to simply manage something we find irritating. We are doing it because we love our dogs.

Thank you Corvus, it was a big decision for me. It's hard to explain but I felt like I needed to try other options first. Strange when I take medications for anxiety myself. Molly was not always storm phobic, she ignored them probably until a year ago. We had another storm tonight, the thunder was not overhead but she was a wreck. She was panting so hard I thought her heart would give out. I didn't give her any Xanax as I hadn't thought to check with her vet that she can have it in addition to Prozac. Will email him. So I just held her tight and turned the tv up

[BC Crazy]

My rescue BC was storm phobic poor lad I just adored him. With unknown genetic's & horrendously abused. He would have a total melt down emotionally 3 hours before a drop of rain or the slightest storm. Countless hours of sitting by his side while he shook/drooled/cried was just the norm with him. I did use meds as he aged to help him & I think it did some what. He was such a lovely boy.

[Santo66]

I just will not breed from anything that is noise phobic before the age of at least 10.

So, you don't breed from any dogs younger than 10? Ten years??

There is some indication that sound sensitivity may be inherited, but it's not as simple as that. A lot of what we might consider genetic traits are more like genetic potentials. What is actually expressed at the end of the day is likely to depend not just on the dog's genetics, but the environment they grew up in, the current environment, stressors they may have been under at times in their development, and of course learning. Maybe even nutrition and what state the dam was in when she was pregnant. My older dog is 4 1/2. He showed his first indication of thunderstorm fear just about a month ago. There's no way that is purely genetic. I am 90% confident he learnt it. And I imagine he learnt it partly because of his temperament and partly because of the relationship he has with other members of our family.

I think we have to be very careful here. I imagine that there are fewer selection pressures on dogs these days for things like trait anxiety than there once was. This is good in a way because we are better equipped to help dogs that are a bit different, but bad in that because we can manage them and are more compassionate towards them we don't select so strongly against them. Writing dogs with problems however minor off as having 'weak nerve' is grossly over simplistic and it isn't fair to the dogs. Maybe they are more prone to things like sound sensitivity than other dogs, but we are also capable of managing them so that this is less of a big deal than it might have been many years ago. In some cases we can even 'cure' them. It is not helpful to the dog to label it as having weak nerve and saying "See, this is why it behaves this way." A) that is not necessarily why they behave that way and B) So what? You owe it to the dog in front of you to do what you can to help them. Putting it all down to genes is a good way to absolve yourself of the responsibility of trying to help them and avoiding the opportunity to examine and possibly improve the way you manage and train dogs.

Something would IHMO need to happen to the dog to learn consequence of a particular noise........if for instance following a clap of thunder the dog felt pain it may learn to associate pain with the sound of thunder and show fear, but ultimately it's strength of nerve from a genetic perspective. Perhaps your dog didn't show avoidance to thunder, but it may have been on the cusp and unless tested for nerve as occurs with a guide dog for example, your dog may not be overly strong in nerve anyway.........it's not a thing in pet dogs that a high level of importance is placed and I think too many phobias are blamed upon environment to mask breeding practices that could have been done better in selection of mating pairs.

Of course you help the noise phobic dog and do you best to try and eliminate the stress, but the point I was making if next time you don't want a noise phobic dog, select a breeder who doesn't produce the fault.

Edited December 1, 2012 by Santo66

[corvus]

Something would IHMO need to happen to the dog to learn consequence of a particular noise........

Yes, that is generally what is meant by 'learning'.

but ultimately it's strength of nerve from a genetic perspective. Perhaps your dog didn't show avoidance to thunder, but it may have been on the cusp and unless tested for nerve as occurs with a guide dog for example, your dog may not be overly strong in nerve anyway.........it's not a thing in pet dogs that a high level of importance is placed and I think too many phobias are blamed upon environment to mask breeding practices that could have been done better in selection of mating pairs.

And the point I was making is that blaming phobias on breeding may mask HANDLING practices that could have been done better. Because the behaviour expressed is a product of genetics and environment. Maybe my older dog had the potential for thunder phobia all along, but when he was younger the conditions weren't there for it to be expressed, but now they are. What if they had never been present? I would never know what potential that dog had for a sound phobia. What's more, I don't know at this point whether his current behaviour is in response to the thunder itself or whether he has associated the thunder with his pal being stressed out and is therefore actually concerned about that instead. Those are two completely different traits. On top of that, we don't actually know the heritability of sound sensitivity, but I would not be surprised if it is greater in gundogs than in other breeds, for example. There's nothing to be gained from oversimplifying this, which is exactly what you are doing.

[smooch]

storm came through at 3am this morning, Smooch was trying to climb under the bed which is only 3 inches off the ground, gave him the RR, put the TS and ear muffs on and in a few min he settled. When that passed I took the ear muffs off. Another clap of thunder came in at about 6am, smooch was cuddled up to me in bed and all of a sudden the bed started shaking, put the ear muffs on (TS was still on him) and he settled again. So far I think the combination of the three is working but I guess we won't really know until we get another storm straight overhead.

[BC Crazy]

My Stella is very noise phobic. She is a mess emotionally in storms like last night. She doesn't predict them though & her nervousness starts when the storm does, not before.

I tried everything to conditioner her as a pup the same as I did with Sonny & he loves them. She is just a totally different dog. She just shuts down. I hope it doesn't storm

again this afternoon as I'm off to a wedding, my brother is getting married. I won't be there long if the bad weather returns though. I will make sure she is secure before I go

& lucky it is only minutes away.

I was unaware that this phobia was genetic. Learnt something there. Stella's mum is quite highly strung I have found out. Maybe it is coming from her.

Edited December 2, 2012 by BC Crazy

[disintegratus]

My rotti x was storm phobic when we got her, and we found out the hard way. We weren't home, and the poor thing scratched at the door until she tore a claw and sprayed blood all over the door, then managed to jump over the gate, we picked her up from the emergency vet up the road where someone had thankfully handed her in.

I didn't do very much about it, I spent a little bit of time with her out in the rain and storms, and over time she's gotten over it, though these days if there's a very close clap of thunder she will bark at it once or twice, but she doesn't freak out anymore :D

[disintegratus]

My rotti x was storm phobic when we got her, and we found out the hard way. We weren't home, and the poor thing scratched at the door until she tore a claw and sprayed blood all over the door, then managed to jump over the gate, we picked her up from the emergency vet up the road where someone had thankfully handed her in.

I didn't do very much about it, I spent a little bit of time with her out in the rain and storms, and over time she's gotten over it, though these days if there's a very close clap of thunder she will bark at it once or twice, but she doesn't freak out anymore :D

[Santo66]

I was unaware that this phobia was genetic. Learnt something there. Stella's mum is quite highly strung I have found out. Maybe it is coming from her.

We have a friend who got a failed Labrador from the blind school for a pet..........he was an awesome pet dog who was partially trained and for our purpose was pretty well bomb proof to noise, but he wasn't strong enough for a guide dog in noise to the high standards they require which caused him to fail their selection process. My dog at the time was terribly storm and noise phobic and we had a good chat to the trainers about it and they claimed absolutely 100% the phobia which is fear of noise was a genetic nerve weakness which the breeders who supply guide dogs actually breed to prevent it by only using breeding pairs of high nerve strength. It makes sense as it wouldn't be a good situation for a guide dog to freak out from a storm or loud noises when the poor owner is blind and reliant on the dog's stability.

[BC Crazy]

Santo thats interesting. As I understand it even though this little lab was breed from 100% storm proof dogs this particular pup was still noise phobic sometimes, so it also must come down to each individual pups temp as well as the genetic link. Correct me if I am wrong.

[BC Crazy]

Stella was going o.k. with storms as a puppy but when she was about 6 months old we had a very severe storm which we do get here at times & it came from nowhere, extreme winds & thunder. Stella was inside with us but I think that night was when she began fearing them. I was very frightened that particular night so maybe she could sense that too. Total blackout, me rushing about for a torch etc. now she is very storm phobic unfortunately. Although she has always been very noise phobic. The slightest sound & her first instinct is to panic / whine & run. So sad really & I do feel for her as it musn't be a very peaceful way to live. I am unaware of anyway you can counter condition that behave though.

[corvus]

My dog at the time was terribly storm and noise phobic and we had a good chat to the trainers about it and they claimed absolutely 100% the phobia which is fear of noise was a genetic nerve weakness which the breeders who supply guide dogs actually breed to prevent it by only using breeding pairs of high nerve strength.

It is possible they don't know what they are talking about. They certainly haven't read the relevant literature that I have read. Like I said, in gundogs it's likely this is more heritable than in other breeds. I know of no traits that have been shown to be 100% heritable. I know that the service dog organisation I work with does not just trust blindly to their dogs 'nerve'. They breed most of their dogs themselves, and still they include dealing with loud noises in their training.

Counter-conditioning a panicky dog may be possible with added support of a Thundershirt or in more extreme cases, medication.

[BC Crazy]

We use both Thundershirt & meds with Stella with some improvement. She definatley doesn't get to the same level of intensity & she recovers quicker now which is good.

[smooch]

We had a bad storm here late this afternoon, when the storm was about half a hour away I put the thundershirt and mut muffs onto Smooch also gave him a dose of Rescue Remedy, he survived the storm pretty well, he mostly lay on the floor next to me instead of trying to climb under the computer table. Finally a win.

[HazyWal]

That's great news Smooch, it was an awful storm

[BC Crazy]

Yes thats wonderful progress Smooch. We just got back from fishing in the boat yesterday with Sonny & Stella when the storm hit. It was horrendeous & caught us by surprise as it came over very quickly.Poor Stella was a mess. So I put her Thunder Shirt on & gave her some meds. I just sat it out with her on her bed in the corner of our closed annex till it passed only to return again a few hours later We aren't making very much progress in this area unfortunately. So we just sit it out together.

Edited October 29, 2013 by BC Crazy

[sandgrubber]

I was unaware that this phobia was genetic. Learnt something there. Stella's mum is quite highly strung I have found out. Maybe it is coming from her.

We have a friend who got a failed Labrador from the blind school for a pet..........he was an awesome pet dog who was partially trained and for our purpose was pretty well bomb proof to noise, but he wasn't strong enough for a guide dog in noise to the high standards they require which caused him to fail their selection process. My dog at the time was terribly storm and noise phobic and we had a good chat to the trainers about it and they claimed absolutely 100% the phobia which is fear of noise was a genetic nerve weakness which the breeders who supply guide dogs actually breed to prevent it by only using breeding pairs of high nerve strength. It makes sense as it wouldn't be a good situation for a guide dog to freak out from a storm or loud noises when the poor owner is blind and reliant on the dog's stability.

While noise sensitivity may not be heredity, I do think strong nerves have a genetic component.

Storm phobia and gun / fireworks phobia often go together. Gun dogs, at least in the times when they were widely used for hunting, were strongly selected not to be afraid of guns. No Lab breeder worth their salt would breed from a gun-shy (or thunder shy) dog. I've know a few Labs who were storm aggressive . . . ie they went out into storms and attempted to drive away the thunder by barking at it.