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Behaviour and Emotions
Aggression
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Aggression Aggression is a serious problem, and needs to be identified early.
Dogs may be aggressive because they are fearful, they may be defending their territory, they may be exerting dominance behaviour over their people or it may be that the behaviour is encouraged as ‘good watch dog’ behaviour.
Cats are often aggressive due to fear and from not being used to be handled. Cats that are born feral sometimes exhibit fear aggression and need to be socialised slowly.
If your dog has indicated ANY aggression towards children or other people or even yourself, seek veterinary advice and professional counseling straight away. At worst, your dog may seriously injure someone, you may be sued, and your dog may be destroyed.
If your dog is identified as aggressive or shows symptoms of aggressive potential, your dog should be on a leash at all times, and may need to be muzzled when outside his own environment. He should never be left unsupervised, particularly with children. It just isn’t worth the risk. Even if your dog is an angel with you, you should not put at risk other people or animals.
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Animal & Human Socialisation
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Animal to Animal Socialisation
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Barking
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Barking is one way dogs communicate but can become a nuisance when excessive. Barking can be reduced or stopped but only when we understand what is underlying the barking. Many dogs are bored and understimulated all day and so they like the sound of their own voice for company. Maybe this dog can’t see the source of that interesting noise or smell and is barking to find out. Perhaps he is telling everyone that there is a strange person or dog in the neighbourhood. Or perhaps it is a symptom of separation anxiety. Each of these situations will be treated differently.
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Concentration
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Confidence
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Destructiveness and Chewing
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Fear
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Fear affects many pets. It can be learnt (from previous bad experiences) or it can be part of the breeding or socialisation that your pet received when young. Fear of certain types of people including children, fear of vets and fear of loud noises are quite common. But some dogs and cats are generally anxious and fearful most of the time, as though it is part of their personality. Dogs might urinate, attempt to escape or even bite when fearful. Cats may become increasingly nervous, scratch, hiss or urinate inappropriately
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Hyperactivity
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Nervousness
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Nervousness and anxiety can underlie many other pet behaviour conditions including fear aggression, separation anxiety and a host of other behavioural disorders in dogs and can be a constant source of stress.
Sometimes anti-anxiety drugs may need to be used. If the anxiety is mild then complementary therapies can be considered either on their own or in conjunction with conventional treatment. However, it is also important to reduce or eliminate the anxiety through modifying behaviour.
This can be a process of desensitisation where you gradually introduce the cause of stress in a supportive environment, so that your pet becomes tolerant of it. You might consider removing causes of stress by providing company and a secure environment. It is also important to provide regular exercise, especially in the evening, before bed, and play and touch therapies can do much to help relieve anxiety.
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Obsessive Compulsiveness
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Behaviour that is repetitive, seems to have no purpose or is odd may be symptomatic of obsessive-compulsive disorder, especially if it occupies your pet's time a lot, or causes you or your pet distress.
A chemical imbalance or frustration may be the cause of your pet’s obsessive tail chasing, snapping at imaginary bugs, repetitive barking, and self-mutilation or staring into space.
Conventional treatment includes the use of medication along side stress reduction, enriching the environment and not reinforcing the behaviour with attention. Sometimes simply reducing stress is enough. A referral to a behavioural specialist is usually necessary to unravel this problem.
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Sensitivity to Touch
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Separation anxiety
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Separation anxiety affects many dogs. Dogs are meant to be part of a pack, even if that means their people are that pack. So when a dog is left alone all day, and isolated, he may either accept the situation and rest all day, or he may become extremely anxious, whimpering, barking, howling, whining, panting and may even go to the toilet inside the house. He may even begin to destroy furniture or the garden in his frantic attempts to escape to find his ‘pack’. It is the urgency and sense of panic that distinguishes separation anxiety from poor house training, watchdog barking or playful destruction.
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Stress
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Probably the most overwhelming influence on pets’ health is stress. Stress is a normal response to extra demands, be they physical or emotional. Like people, a pet’s body will adapt to stress via the immune system, the nervous and hormonal systems. Stress causes release of hormones from the brain, adrenal glands and pancreas to enable the body to respond appropriately.
Good stress such as exercise and play can enliven and enhance life energy. However, chronic stress or distress can build up over time, leading to depletion of hormones and life energy that eventually debilitates the body. On the other hand repeated good stress (like play and exercise) can help a pet to adapt to prevent distress and disease.
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Thunder and loud noises
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Thunder, fireworks or other loud noises affect many dogs. It is an irrational fear that can worsen over time. One of the suggested methods of assisting this problem is to play CDs with thunder and other noises on it to desensitise dogs. However, this doesn’t always work.
Severely affected dogs may benefit from anti-anxiety medication for short periods, or in anticipation of stormy weather to help them. It’s also worth considering whether petting and soothing your dog when she is distressed is a good idea. This is because your dog may interpret this as praise for her behaviour. It would be better to attempt to distract her by offering a raw meaty bone, or a game or to encourage her to stay in a secure spot.
We have a number of factsheets and products that may help you to assist your dogs build their confidence.
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Training
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Travel
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Urination
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Urinary tract problems, inadequate house training, marking or anxiety may cause inappropriate peeing.
Pets may urinate when greeting you or when they are scolded. This is usually submissive urination, where your pet is telling you that he is lower in the pecking order, and this is his way of showing his lower status. Punishment merely confuses him, and makes him feel even worse. Instead it should be avoided and preferably ignored. If your dog pees when he greets you, ignore him completely when you enter the home. Puppies in particular are prone to this problem but often grow out of it as they mature.
Cats often urinate in inappropriate places to mark their territory or because they do not want to use a soiled litter tray. Natural products can help prevent pets weeing in the incorrect place and also to clean up after them.
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The Anxiety Wrap
Anxiety Wraps for dogs & cats. Holistically reducing/ending fear, shyness & thunderstorm phobias & other behavior problems
Our price: AUS$80.00
(US$ 56.80)
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Feliway - The secret to happy cats
Feliway helps reduce unwanted stress, fear, anxiety of situations such as moving house, new arrivals, holiday homes visits to the vet etc
Feliway® is a product which reproduces certain pacifying properties of cat facial pheromones.
The placing of facial pheromones is a b...
Our price: AUS$73.50
(US$ 52.18)
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HEALTHY DOGS : A Handbook of Natural Therapies
More people are turning to a natural lifestyle and are realising the benefits of being treated holistically (the whole body and not just the symptoms). Conventional medications, although effective may have uunwanted side effects, especially for long term use. Nutrition is also a huge factor in ...
Our price: AUS$29.00
(US$ 20.59)
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Barking Problems Solved
Why do dogs bark?
Barking is a natural behaviour but just what causes some dogs to bark excessively annoying their owners and the entire neighbourhood?
Excitement, boredom, stress, pain; all reasons to bark.
Why does your dog bark?
And how do you stop the barking?
Our price: AUS$9.95
(US$ 7.06)
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