Traveling with dog
When you first welcome your dog to your family, bringing them to home would be the very first time for them to ride a car with you. They maybe experiencing life in this world just about 10 weeks or so by then and, car ride could be quite a big thing for them.
If you look the world through their eyes, car is not natural thing to them. You stay at one place in funky thing (car) and view passing by in front of you and you feel motion constantly.. What would you feel if you were your dogs.If you have not experienced car ride,you maybe scared,nervous,and so much stressed out.
Our dog “Palette” does good for car ride most part. When she is not good,she tends to whine for patting,and put her head under my hands asking for patting and start barking loud when she feels/sense the car was about to stop. It is excitement barking. She is ready to out to explore the world and when we take her to Petsmart for example, she runs as first as she can and she does not need any guide which way to go.She goes straight to the automatic door and busting in
I know she loves car ride.I can tell because when she senses she can come with us,she dash towards car door ready to hop in and so excited. I don’t think she is stressed out. For her, mostly,whiny for attention seeking plus excitement barking when she knows she is about to get off from car.
For her,it strange but when we put Queltic music we have some quiet moment without attention seeking whine. I know there are CD out there that supposedly calm the dogs mind for car ride,but I have not tried the CD so,I do not know if it works or not.Did anybody tried the Calming CD for your dog to ride the car?
Other thing that seems helping is keep the crate door open and she can come out when she wants to look outside and smell the Air by stepping on my lap,nose sticking out a little. She goes back to crate when she thinks she saw enough,and lay down.
Every Christmas,we do 12 hours car ride to visit our in law family and,constant attention seeking whine is not pleasurable. Last year,I decided to ignore her when I felt too much and,I pretended I was sleeping and,she was whining first but since I am not easy to given in,she gave it up and she too took a nap beside me or at least be quiet laying on side. So, for our dog, car ride is fun excitable thing.
However,for some dogs,car ride can be fearful,stressful thing. Dogs can get carsick as well.If you see dog panting hard,drooling,vomiting,these can be from stressful situation more than motion sickness.
According to humane society of WI,car sick/fearful attitude can be overcome by associating car with tasty treats. They suggest click and treat when dog gets approach to car,then if it were okay,let the dog in (no engine running) click and treat,after that was done,dogs inside the car with engine on and click and treat when dogs did not show any stressful sign,then, start car ride around neighborhood(short distance).After that,make the distance longer as you go and give treats when the dog show no stressful sign.As a goal,try take your dog to places where fun awaits,not just places like vet clinic or grooming place where they may not like a lot. To read detail from humane society Wisconsin site,please click here.
With true carsick from motion of the car,I have read in dog magazine that ginger snaps can be helpful for carsick dog but I am not sure if it works or not.
When we usually take our dog with us,we try to feed at least one hour before the car ride.Our dog has not vomited before inside the car and,maybe she does not get carsick,but we feed one hour before the trip to be sure she is not going to be in the car with full stomach with uncomfortable feeling.Also,we make sure she does potty before car ride. Then,when we do long car ride like 12 hrs,we stops at rest area and,we take Palette for potty and gives her chance to breathe in the air and explore around a little.
And, we normally keep paper towel,poop bags,towels to wipe paws if outside were wet,and bring water bottles (Changing places means changing water too (hard water,soft water etc) and sometimes,it gives digestive upset for our dog. So,bringing water bottles helps.
My favorite of all is collapsible water bowl. Ours is square,and it is light weight and it can be fold and you can stuck it in top of the crate or somewhere narrow.It is kind of like this.I actually got the collapsible bowl as free gift with magazine subscription and it has no brand name on it so,it maybe custom made for the magazine company but I like this a lot.
When we visit our in law family,we pack her blush,bathing needs,some toys like Frisbee or balls,treats,and we put her meal and feeding mat into cooler.Then,we put collapsible crate(I-crate).It hold flat and it does not take much space so,it is good.Inside the car,we put travel crate,and use it when we needed to keep her in there when we needed to pick up quick lunch etc. Then,last but not least,we bring her gottago door bell. It is very useful when it comes to travel time.Because she is associating bell with potty already so,even if she goes to new place,she knows bell equal to potty so,we never miss her potty call. Only thing we need to do is to tell her where the bell will be.
What kind of things do you take when you trip with your dogs? Do you have your favorite thing to take with you for trip with your dogs just like I like bringing collapsible bowl or gottago door bell etc?
