![]() Otis had a problematic history, which increased his chances of ending up with noise phobia. “It takes years to keep getting a little bit worse until it gets to the tipping point,” Dr. Indeed, the average age for a dog to develop noticeable thunderstorm phobia is age 7. Finally, in year three, he won’t step outside.” For that dog, the third time is the tipping point. In year two the dog may feel, “Not again,” and become more frightened but not necessarily display his anxiety. In year one, the dog may not like the fireworks and just deals. Borns-Weil says, “yet he’s becoming more sensitized all the time. “You can have a dog who for many years doesn’t react outwardly,” Dr. He got scared on Thursdays even when the truck did not come.) ![]() Some dogs even become afraid of July.” (We’ve heard of one dog who hated Thursdays because that’s the day of the week the noisy garbage truck came. So we see dogs that not only become afraid of the noise, but also afraid of the neighborhood where they heard the noise. Not just on the fourth of July, but you’ve got people letting off firecrackers two weeks before and two weeks after. “It’s thunderstorm season, but worse than that, it’s fireworks season. “July is the worst month of the year for dogs,” the veterinary behaviorist comments. Cheney’s letter to us outlining her difficulties with Otis - July 9 - provides a strong clue. Cheney is why the problem started to occur almost a year after her family brought Otis home to live with them.ĭr. Cheney, “he is very skittish of loud noises, such as fireworks and backfiring cars,” and it is because of noises like those that he digs in his heels and works not to leave the house. It can take some working backwards to figure out the cause. A lot of times, a dog will try not to budge from the house, and it’s not necessarily apparent that noise phobia is the cause of the problem. Cheney is actually lucky that she was able to draw a line between Otis’s noise phobia and his unwillingness to go outside, Dr. It means the problem has finally reached a tipping point, and the dog now exhibits clinical signs that are apparent to the owner.”Ĥ Reasons a Dog’s Behavior Changes ‘Out of the Blue’ġ. But, she remarks, contrary to appearances, “it may not be of the blue. Otis and Teddy each has one of the four main reasons a dog’s behavior will appear to change out of nowhere. The head of the Tufts Animal Behavior Clinic, Stephanie Borns-Weil, DVM, isn’t at all surprised by these changes. Every morning the family has been waking up to one of his “deposits.” As a stop-gap measure, the Costellos have taken to locking him in his crate at night so he won’t destroy the dining room carpet. Costello is upset because wonderful one-year-old Teddy, a well-socialized and happily charming Maltese-poodle mix, has started pooping in the house. “Many times we can coax him out, but only briefly and just to ‘take care of business.'” She is worried not just about Otis relieving himself but also about his getting the proper exercise and, at least as important, “helping him relax and enjoy his walks again.” But now, loud noises “agitate him to the point of refusing to go out at all,” she says. When she and her husband first adopted him about a year ago, she says, “he walked very well. Cheney, her five-year-old basset hound, Otis, has begun balking about going outside. Both have dogs whose behavior was perfectly delightful - until the day that it wasn’t. So is Carol Costello of Hingham, Massachusetts. Annette Cheney of Raleigh, North Carolina, is upset.
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