What my dogs teach me
What happened to little Zani while I was at work one day? Summer was in the crate. Cricket was in the other room. But something had gotten Zani very very worried, and she took a long time to recover.
I have already written about and published many pictures of my feral dog Clara when she was frightened and stressed at the vet’s office.
Now I’m sharing what Zani looks like when she is frightened. Continue reading “The Look of Fear”
You might want to compare this post with “Dog Facial Expressions: Can You See the Stress?” That post from 2022 features Lewis, who is showing stress in a different way.
From 2013.
Poor Clara had her yearly vet visit this past week. She is my feral dog, and although I have two socialization sessions with her every week and she is making great progress, I have not worked with her at the vet. Going to the vet is graduate school, and she’s just to 7th grade or so.
So what do you do when you have to put your dog in a situation for which they are not ready to be comfortable? What I did was take lots of food for distractions and get through it as fast as possible.
For Clara, getting shots or other procedures that cause a bit of pain is not the problem. Being in a building with other people and dogs in close proximity, and being handled and restrained by strangers is. This is by far the most frightened she has ever been at the vet’s, probably because Continue reading “Dog Facial Expressions: Stress”
Just a quick body language observation item today. I love watching slow-motion footage of my dogs since so much is happening that I normally don’t see.
I had suspected for a while that Summer had at least two distinct “lip licks.” Lip licks, lip flicks, or nose licks are believed to be stress signals for most dogs. I certainly think they are for Summer and Zani. The slightest hint of untoward events and it is Lip Lick City at my house. It is embarrassingly easy to get one on film. All I have to do is walk straight toward either of them with stiff body language and they’ll usually do it. Both of them are incredibly pressure-sensitive. (I try to mind my body language on their behalf, but I’m a klutzy human so of course I bother them a couple of times a day by accident.)
Anyway, here is a short movie comparing what I believe to be stress lip licks from both Summer and Zani, contrasted with what I believe is a happy relaxed lip lick from Summer. Both of these lip licks can be seen in the video in Does Your Dog REALLY Want to Be Petted? One lip lick means no, another yes.
So does anybody else’s dog have a “happy lip lick” like Summer?
Copyright 2012 Eileen Anderson