What do you do in a storm?

[RSbunny]

How does your dog react to a storm?

Biscuit doesn't care at all. she usually just sleeps right through them. The other day however, we were in the car and she did wake up from passing out in the back seat and sit up and watch the rain. but she was happy. I think she woke up cause I was driving at 40km per hour in an 80km zone, had no-one taking over me and literally could not see what was a few metres ahead of me. The road was flooding and so I was driving soooo carefully. I got to my mum's work and stopped. Cars were being pulled by the water on the road so I didn't want to park on the side of the road for fear of someone losing control and hitting me. So that's why she sat up for!!

Cindy on the other hand is terrified. We made her that way, not knowing the damage we were doing. Now she is 12 (she's been like it for a few years now) and it's a matter of riding one out with her, in fear of her having a heart attack. She goes into a full panic, she shakes, she drools, she has nervous panting and up until a couple of years ago she would jump the fence (something she hasn't done since we first got her) and run the walk mum and dad took her on every day to try and find them....but run like she has never run....truly on adrenalin. She has an emergency bush flower spray (more effective than the rescue remedy) and herbal nerve tablets. It's 3.30am and I've been up with her for the last hour riding a storm out but it has finally stopped and she has calmed down (after 3 nerve tablets....the spray is at my p's house) so I'm off to bed! Alex thinks I'm crazy but if I don't sit with her and she does have a heart attack and I find her dead I'd never ever forgive myself.

[PicOlio]

Polo hasn't been in a storm yet so "who knows"

Samson and Max didn't care at all about storms... well... I take that back. Max didn't care but Samson actually preferred to swim in the rain so we had to work to keep him inside during a storm lol

Chelsea, however, was PETRIFIED of thunder storms.... as you say "full panic attack". Entire body shaking uncontrollably and doing everything she could to hide in the smallest darkest corner she could find with tail between her legs etc...

At first I sat with her... "It's ok sweety...it's almost over...it's ok" really trying to be calm and loving. Then I did some research on the issue and found that I was doing it "all wrong" and successfully making the problem worse.

I switched my behavior.... Rather than consoling her through the scary time I started getting loud and playful. Pulling out all her favorite treats and toys and made an EXTREME CRAZY EFFORT to make Storm-Time equal PLAY-TIME

With every large boom and crack of the thunder she'd get "WOOOHOOO GOOD GIRL HERE'S ANOTHER TREAT!!!!" and in between the noises I'd toss the ball around or play tug with her.... then CRACK! "WOOHOO GOOD GIRL HERE'S A TREAT"

In Florida we had plenty of storms to work this out with. Now she's ABSOLUTELY FINE during a storm and will actually grab her toys and start tossing them around during the storms. I still keep reinforcing "storm time = play time" by giving out treats etc...but not as aggressively as I use to do.

Making it FUN made it ok for her.

Trying to "console her" as if I was "in this scary storm with her" never helped to actually calm her down.

So now I'm a firm believer in turning up the noise and increasing the FUN TIME during bad storms...

[DirtySouthChins]

It's been storming here since last night, and it's so funny around our house..... We have scooby (the alfa male) that runs and hides everytime it thunders, we have Dakota,Gidget,Beau, and Jessie playing in the rain on the back patio (when the door is open), until it lightnings then it's a different story
Jessie and Dakota will actually sit out there trying to catch rain drops (the nerds). Tabitha just sleeps as she is the "I just don't care" dog, and Dante well he pretty much doesn't care either, every now and then he get's a spark and starts doing laps around the house, but that is about it.

[Phoebe'sBean]

Well, it doesn't storm much in this wonderful desert but Phoebe isn't too fond of them. Once, we had her outside because it was a nice day, but these clouds rolled out of no where and we were at work and school. My mom took two of her breaks together and drove home to put her inside, and she was cold and wet just after a few minutes of rain. She was dry soon, thanks to my mom, and she was fine, but she will NOT go outside if it's raining now, flat out refuses. (And instead of going outside leaves lovely messes by the back door. )

[Sasami]

Rocky doesn't seem to care much...he's pretty oblivious . Sophie used to completely freak out but she's getting better.

[Scarlette]

Riley doesn't mind one bit because she can't hear what's going on! Scarlette gets a little nervous and pants alot but she gets over it in a few minutes.

[Chinchilla_Girl]

Kali and Orion get up in the front window to watch the light storm...occasionally a really loud crack will get Orion nervous, but for the most part, they don't really care about thunder. We live so close to the military base, half the time it sounds like it's thundering anyway with all the training going on (often at 3AM)

[Jodi]

Tito and Snooper don't seem to mind too much... except Tito will jump a little at the thunder and cuddle closer.

Manto doesn't usually do much when it storms but during one particularly bad thunderstorm he freaked out a little. I comforted him until it was over and then he was fine.

Now Toby?? (yeah yeah, I know he's a bird) he gets really excitable during storms.

[starleomach]

Caroline is deaf so she sleeps through the actual storm, but she does get a bit weird a couple hours before the storm...what am I saying she is always weird lol

[Dena]

My two don't have any reaction to storms. My one doesn't like really hard blasts of cold wind very much but she definitely isn't scared of it. The only thing they really don't like is when the dryer is on, I should say one of them doesn't like. Have no idea why.