“I’m bored” When Cesar took on the case of Fella, an adorable Jack Russell/Italian Greyhound mix, the little dog’s antics were about to get his owner slapped with an eviction notice. At the apartment complex where Fella resided, he barked nonstop the entire time his adoptive mom was at work, ceasing only once she came home at night. The complex manager liked Fella’s owner, but when other tenants began complaining loudly, she didn’t feel she had a choice: Do something about the barking, she said, or you’re going to have to move out. A notorious barker when he was at the shelter, Fella also yelped incessantly whenever he was in a car, and was overtly hostile toward other dogs. But it wasn’t long before Cesar got to the bottom of things. It turned out that high-energy Fella got only 15 minutes of exercise a day. So while separation anxiety was obviously a factor here, it was merely symptomatic of a much greater problem: Poor little Fella was bored out of his mind. In the widely acclaimed behavior guide How Dogs Think, psychologist and author Stanley Coren asserts that in a case like Fella’s, how long a dog barks has everything to do with the message being sent. “The underlying rule,” he says, “seems to be that the longer the sound, the more likely the dog is making a conscious decision about the nature of the signal and the behaviors that are about to follow.” Taking into account the rate of repetition, Coren notes, is also critical to accurate interpretation. “Sounds that are repeated frequently, or at a rapid rate, indicate a degree of urgency.” Faced with the fact that a return to the shelter might mean euthanasia, Fella’s owner got the message, admitting she’d been selfish in not devoting more time to developing an exercise regimen that would address Fella’s considerable needs. With Cesar’s help, she worked out a rigorous daily walking routine, as well as a morning ritual that involved brief but increasingly lengthy periods of separation, meant to prove to Fella that his owner’s leaving did not signify permanent abandonment. When Cesar returned to the apartment complex several months later, Fella was still happily ensconced, and there wasn’t a tenant to be found who’d heard him barking. *Dee
Posted on: Fri, 01 Nov 2013 20:15:56 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015