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4th of July fireworks

hbmama

hbmama

Well-known member
Well, we went to a nice backyard barbeque this afternoon and took Dottie along of course to play with her best friend (an affenpinscher). We sat in the yard and could hear firecrackers and poppers in the distance, and we kept talking and relaxing as usual like they were no big deal. (I wasn't sure how she would react as this is our first Independence Day with her.)
The good news is, she found the noises mildly interesting and continued her normal routine of visiting and exploring in the patio bushes.

When we got home, we sat outside in our backyard because that is when the big bombs started going off, later in the evening. We didn't flinch or act like it was a big deal, and some of the artillery these kids had going in the neighborhood was loud and flashy. (City ordinance says no fireworks of any kind but they all just do it anyway.) Dottie did fantastic, was not the least bit stressed, and happily chased moths while all of this was going on. Her hearing is very acute, as she can hear me whisper "Cookie" from the other side of the house and she comes running.

I am really thankful that she can take all of this craziness in stride, as it will make it easier for her to train for therapy assistance later on. My friends dogs always get so upset that she has to gently sedate them or they could go through a plate glass window with panic. Hope the rest of the U.S. board members dogs weathered this holiday okay too, with little stress!!
 
I have one dog that gets scared, but luckily none of our country neighbors went crazy this year and there were no fireworks. I was relieved.
 
You've really got the best approach. Act nonchalant and make it a no biggee. We didn't have any problems last night. We could hear the fireworks but neither dog reacted. We get the Blue Angels over our house every year and I'm always amazed at how the dogs don't react to them. I react more than they do :rolleyes:
 
I too was worried about what Jato would do with all of the noise, but he wasn't bothered by it at all. :rah: In fact, I think he liked seeing the sky light up with the fireworks. We didn't stay outside long because the mosquitos were biting.
 
We were able to find a location in our city where we could watch the fireworks but not really hear them so we took maverick and he was more interested in the bugs then anything.
 
Melissa said:
We were able to find a location in our city where we could watch the fireworks but not really hear them so we took maverick and he was more interested in the bugs then anything.
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Ha, same here!!! Dottie was so busy hunting and chasing June bugs that she could have cared less about the sparkles and bombs bursting all around! Thank goodness!
 
I even picked him up and made him look at them but nope no interest. I was interesting watching them from that far because you could see the whole firework without moving your head and the end was really cool to see as a whole clump instead of it just taking up and whole sky and not being sure what to focus on.
 
chasing June bugs
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I had to laugh at this. We took the dogs for a walk in downtown La Jolla yesterday. They were very badly behaved....not sure what in the world was going on with them. Jake kept "talking" and Shelby was pulling. I commented that it was like walking two June bugs on a string. I don't think anyone understood my description....except my mom ;) On the upside...we saw a blenheim Cavalier and ran into a woman from Arizona that has two Cavaliers.
 
No problems with fireworks either....

We took our four dogs out on our sailboat and side-tied with three other boats in the bay. We had 365 degrees of fireworks lasting almost an hour. None of the dogs had any problems. I had taken Gem and Monty out before with no problems, but this was the first year that we took our little rescues, Sapphire and Harley. They all had their life jackets and tethers "just in case". The worst that happened was Gem looked a little sea sick for a few moments when the boats got rocked due to wakes kicked up by passing boats. Otherwise they slept through the entire show.

Harley LOVED the boat ride. He is our salty dog. You should seen them snap to attention when a pelican flew by....they had never seen a bird that was bigger than them.
J.

PS Cathy, we get june bugs here (in June of course). Drives me nuts because I always think that they are dead and that one of the dogs has brought them in and when I go to pick them up, they jump away! I just can't imagine Shelby and Jake being naughty!
 
I'm very glad to hear that my dog is not the only one OBSESSED with June bugs! She's my first dog, so I wasn't really aware that these bugs are so enticing to them. We had a puppy visit at the vet's yesterday and I asked her about Holly eating June bugs. She said there is actually a veterinary label for stomach problems associated with this -- called June bug gastroconjunctivitis (or something like that):rolleyes:

As for the fireworks, I took her out when a few were going off in the distance, just to try to desensitize a little to the noise. I'm not sure she noticed the fireworks, even when they became fairly loud. We didn't stay out long (I wanted to end on a good note), but I think this year went pretty well.
 
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