Fear of thunder- hours after storm??

[jrh258]

Hi all,
Sadie and I had an interesting walk today...there was a thunderstorm at about 9:30 am. I was at work, so Sadie was home alone. It was a pretty bad one. She is scared of storms. I got home at 5 (the dog walker had been in twice- once at noon and once at 3:00). I took her for a walk and she was terrified of everything. She is usually quite confident on walks, but today her tail was between her legs and she looked frightened. She barked and growled at children, a man on crutches, a fallen tree, a ladder. These are things she normally has no problems with (exception the guy on crutches- not sure she's seen those before). She pulled on the leash the whole way and kept jumping up on me. These are not behaviors I've seen from her in months. I turned back to go home much earlier than usual because she would not stop barking and growling at anything that moved, and she PULLED. I mean, almost pulled me over, she was tugging so hard to get home! Once we got home, she seemed fine. Could this be a result of the thunderstorm, which happened over 7 hours BEFORE our walk? Did I do the right thing by just turning back early and getting her home, or does that encourage fearful behavior? If it thunders again, how do I ease her stress? This seems like a long time to be upset over a storm. She did bite me after a storm once, but that was also on a day when the vet came and I had a houseguest. Today it is just the storm.

[jrh258]

Addendum! My dog walker just walked her for about 10 minutes, brought her back in and gave her some food...and when he didn't back away fast enough, she growled. It was her normal food, nothing high value (at least, it's not usually). She didn't snap or snarl or bite, which is good, but is it possible that a thunderstorm so long ago could cause such fearful behavior, and cause her to "regress" with the food guarding? She's just not herself!

[JudyN]

I think it's very likely to be the thunderstorm - it must have been scary for her being all alone when it happened, and if you were, say, held at gunpoint in a robbery, you'd still be stressed out for a long time after. Also, she may still sense a change in air pressure, or hear thunder rumbling further off than you can hear.

You were definitely right to turn for home - in fact it would IMO have been better to turn back earlier, or given her the choice about having a walk at all. This will NOT reinforce fearful behaviour, but will help the stress defuse - and help her bond with you as she knows you won't drag her out when it's scary for her.

Stress hormones can hang around in a dog's system for several days, so keep things as low-stress as possible for a while, and be aware that her threshold for guarding, jumping up and so on will be lower than usual.

[jrh258]

Thank you! She seemed a bit better this morning. Unfortunately it is monsoon season here in Bangladesh, so thunderstorms are going to be quite a common occurrence. Is it possible that she will become desensitized to them if they happen often? My plan is if I am home during a storm to play with her or do a training session and try to distract her, but when I'm at work she'll be on her own

[JudyN]

Yes, if you can find anything she likes to occupy her when there's a storm it will help, but the difficulty is that she might go over threshold quite quickly. You can get tapes of thunder noises so you could try building up from a really quiet sound level.

Other things that might help are ensuring she has a 'den', such as a crate or table covered with blankets that she regards as secure; a Thundershirt (I'm not sure if it's safe to leave these on a dog while unattended); or various medical/herbal remedies (DAP diffuser, valerian & skullcap tablets, etc.).

I'm not an expert - hopefully others will have some more advice.

[Nettle]

If you can get Bach flower remedies, I have found Rock Rose very helpful with severe noise phobia. Obviously you can't give it when you are out, but it's worth a try while you are at home. A lot of dogs find the Dap or ADaptil helpful too, and the thundershirt, as Judy says. Doesn't work for all but does for some.

Also a dark den-like place to hide in helps scared dogs.

They can smell the air changes and feel the change in pressure when a storm approaches.