Without doubt you've heard people say "your dog's bored" before, because dog boredom is sometimes used to explain away all sorts of dog behaviour problems.
Problems like your dog being destructive and chewing up the house, your shoes or the couch especially when you leave your dog home alone.
In truth dog boredom is used to explain away plenty of the signs of separation anxiety in dogs. Symptoms like barking or whining non-stop, or digging up the garden, or your dog running away. Due to this explanation lots of the tips you see to stop your dogs separation anxiety is based around entertaining your dog, or at least distracting them, which might help, but isn't going to get to the core of the difficulty and supply a cure.
Should You Be Feeling Guilty if Your Dog is Bored?
The very worst thing about being told your dogs behavior issues are a result of boredom is that its engineered to get you feeling guilty like you're not doing enough for your dog, either walking then enough or paying them enough attention.
The reverse is generally correct for dogs with separation anxiety, but that does not stop us feeling anious when we go out and leave them and the consequence of that will instead be to extend a dogs anxiousness.
A Quick Walk and a New Toy is Not Always the Answ er
It could also get you focussing on the wrong things when you are trying to deal with your dogs stress. If it was just boredom, you would be able to leave your dog alone with a lot of toys and they ought to be fine, but that does not happen in reality as many of you actually know.
When we start to go looking for a reason to explain bad dog behaviour we frequently make the blunder of humanising dogs, then we come up with an explanation that is perfectly reasonable to us but doesn't necessarily fit with natural dog behavior.
In studies of the wolf pack, naturally a wolf will spend many hours everyday sleeping and hanging around without any proof of boredom or resorting to destructive behavior!
Anway, the solutions we are frequently given to dog boredom, is to start walking them more frequently, leave them on their own for less time, give them toys to play with or feed them. But if you're attempting to stop your dog from scratching up your carpets, or chewing up your cushions while you're out and none of these approaches work it could just be that you did not have a bored dog in the beginning.
Dog Separation Anxiety Training
Sadly , separation anxiety in dogs is not curable with a quick walk and a chewing toy. However if your dog suffers from separation anxiety there are methods to get shot of it. Most vets would agree that a dog separation anxiety training program is the most suitable option, although there are a variety of other products that can help lessen a dogs anxiety along the way.
Problems like your dog being destructive and chewing up the house, your shoes or the couch especially when you leave your dog home alone.
In truth dog boredom is used to explain away plenty of the signs of separation anxiety in dogs. Symptoms like barking or whining non-stop, or digging up the garden, or your dog running away. Due to this explanation lots of the tips you see to stop your dogs separation anxiety is based around entertaining your dog, or at least distracting them, which might help, but isn't going to get to the core of the difficulty and supply a cure.
Should You Be Feeling Guilty if Your Dog is Bored?
The very worst thing about being told your dogs behavior issues are a result of boredom is that its engineered to get you feeling guilty like you're not doing enough for your dog, either walking then enough or paying them enough attention.
The reverse is generally correct for dogs with separation anxiety, but that does not stop us feeling anious when we go out and leave them and the consequence of that will instead be to extend a dogs anxiousness.
A Quick Walk and a New Toy is Not Always the Answ er
It could also get you focussing on the wrong things when you are trying to deal with your dogs stress. If it was just boredom, you would be able to leave your dog alone with a lot of toys and they ought to be fine, but that does not happen in reality as many of you actually know.
When we start to go looking for a reason to explain bad dog behaviour we frequently make the blunder of humanising dogs, then we come up with an explanation that is perfectly reasonable to us but doesn't necessarily fit with natural dog behavior.
In studies of the wolf pack, naturally a wolf will spend many hours everyday sleeping and hanging around without any proof of boredom or resorting to destructive behavior!
Anway, the solutions we are frequently given to dog boredom, is to start walking them more frequently, leave them on their own for less time, give them toys to play with or feed them. But if you're attempting to stop your dog from scratching up your carpets, or chewing up your cushions while you're out and none of these approaches work it could just be that you did not have a bored dog in the beginning.
Dog Separation Anxiety Training
Sadly , separation anxiety in dogs is not curable with a quick walk and a chewing toy. However if your dog suffers from separation anxiety there are methods to get shot of it. Most vets would agree that a dog separation anxiety training program is the most suitable option, although there are a variety of other products that can help lessen a dogs anxiety along the way.
About the Author:
Dog anxiety is increasingly common in dogs, and has affected the author's own rescue dog. Visit her blog to make sure you can tell the difference between dog behaviour problems and dog boredom.
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