Pets feel safe and secure in the presence of their favorite humans, so it’s really no surprise that they become anxious when left home alone. Sometimes it can turn into full-blown separation anxiety. In the case of dogs, this can lead to undesirable behavior: barking, howling, excessive drooling, obsessive pacing, attempts to escape, destroying furniture or other objects, and having “accidents.” Far from reflecting bad character or inadequate training, it’s a deeply rooted psychological condition. Short of never leaving the house, there’s no sure-fire way to reduce separation anxiety, but one thing that can help is leaving quietly and without fuss. There’s no harm in making sure a dog enjoys plenty of play an exercise when you are around. It may also help to feed a dog right before leaving.
One doggy dad was getting noise complaints from neighbors. When he was out, his dog was making an ear-splitting racket. To get to the bottom of the matter, he set up a “nanny cam,” complete with sound recording. The neighbors were right: the dog really was making a lot of noise. What’s really remarkable (and also quite funny) is how it went about it. The dog took its place at the piano and started howling while banging on the keys. And even though this is a small dog, the howling is really, really loud! The crazy thing is that the notes the dog smashes out on the piano actually seem to go pretty well with the howls.
Dogs likely inherited the tendency to howl from their wolf-like ancestors. If this dog really is mindfully composing a piano accompaniment to its howling, this would completely re-write the biology and animal behaviorism textbooks!
Random key pressing or canine composition? What do you think is going on? We’d love to hear your view in the comments at Facebook. Be sure to like and share!
