fear out of nowhere

[loggerboots]

Hi Folks,

 

So, this is strange. All of a sudden, for no obvious reason, Emmie decided she was afraid to be near our kitchen. Wife said she was fine all day, but in the evening I noticed she kept trying to scurry off to the upstairs (which is unusual because she normally wants to be righ next to us).

 

It became obvious when I brought her home from her nightly walk and she didn't want to come in the house. She just sat at the door staring at me. I had to coax her to come in. When she finally did come in, she scurried up to the landing of the stairs leading to our second level rather than come to the living room (which passes by the entrance to the kitchen), which would be normal for her. I called her to come down and she started whimpering nervously. She sounded really sad Again, I had to coax her to come downstairs.

 

The only thing I can remember that might have set this off was my daughter was cooking something while Emmie was eating in the kitchen and she was banging a spatula against a pan trying to knock something off of it. This startled Emmie and she booked out of the kitchen pretty fast. This seems really mild, though, and she's been startled by other things before and hasn't earned a phobia from it.

 

I've read that BC's can be sound sensitive and can be fearful, but this seems like an overreaction to kind of a normal household occurance. Emmie's a rescue, a naturally shy dog, but not overly fearful, though she does startle easy and is very sensitive.

 

She seemed a little better this morning, was just wondering if this seems odd or is just 'a border collie thing'.

[Jumpin Boots]

I'm not so sure this is a border collie thing as much as a dog thing. Renoir quit going into Paul's office for about a month after Paul was playing guitar and his amp freaked out, normally his favorite sleeping place is under the desk in there. We just ignored the reaction and he's back to hanging out in there, although he does exit when Paul begins to play now.

[Shetlander]

Agree that this isn’t so much a Border Collie Issue as a dog one. Now if you said, Sheltie Issue, I’d be inclined to agree. My Sheltie has had her share of fears, some of which popped up suddenly. One was she refused to come into the living room, where I spend a huge amount of time because she was afraid of the reclining sofa, she had grown up with. Apparently, it had reclined “into” her on it’s own one too many times, but there isn’t always a readily obvious rhyme or reason to their fears.

 

Understanding why the fear developed can be very helpful but isn’t always necessary to address the behavior. One thing that helped with the sofa problem was knowing she was objecting to the sudden popping up of the leg rest. I tried to be very careful to control the leg rest going up and cautioned guests to be careful as well. If she was on the sofa with me, as the leg rest went up slowly, she tolerated it better than if she was on the floor at the time.

 

Even more important though, I made a big point of having very good things happen around and on the sofa. All her meals were on the sofa, for instance, which went a long way to making a chow hound get over her reservations. This was huge for her overcoming her fear.

 

You may need to be careful not to overface you dog -- move too fast for them so they are overwhelmed with fear, This may result in the rewards not making up for approaching the scary object/place or worse, their fear is made worse by being pushed too fast. It does help to take a bracing, cheerful, not gonna buy into the fear attitude around the dog. I don’t want to be fussing over the dog’s fear but I also don’t want to be a jerk about the fact she is scared.

 

With my Shelties, I had to figure out how much to ignore, when to push them a bit and when I needed to move very slowly. I always aimed to go at a pace they could handle, or again, the fears can become intensified. At the same time, I did things like tether my Sheltie to me while I was on the sofa so she couldn’t leave the room. I would periodically reward her with treats and over time she got over her concerns about the sofa. But I also took my cues from how she responded to being on or around the sofa before I leashed her to me and the sofa. When she hopped on the sofa to eat meals or accept treats without any hesitation, I figured she could handle the tether for a short amount of time, while I continued to reinforce with food for calm behavior on the sofa. Then I extended the amount of time I kept her tethered.

 

Hope I’m making at least some sense. Good luck!

[GentleLake]

Silly girl.

 

Actually, I do think it may be a BC issue. BCs are known for their often quirky fears and sometimes the reasons for them remain a mystery.

 

Shetlander's advice is good. Don't pander to the fear and for the most part go about your lives as you did before. You could maybe drop some yummy treats just inches beyond where she's balking at the entrance to the kitchen and continue on your way in. If she reaches to take them, an encouraging "Good girl!" would be fine, but not too excitedly. When she takes the treats, add a few more at larger intervals.

 

These should be high value treats. Bits of cooked chicken, beef, liverwurst, etc. that she wouldn't usually get.

[Alchemist]

My older dog became afraid of the photocopy machine (I take both dogs to work with me). So I brought treats with me whenever I had any photocopying to do, tossed on into the photocopy room floor right before I pushed "start". Now all I need to do is pick up a bag of treats, and he runs straight into that room.

 

He also became weird about the drain cover on the ground floor. Wouldn't go anywhere near it. I put treats on it, then progressed to treating him if he'd touch it. From there we went to my saying "go say hi to the monster", at which point he'll race down the hall, touch the drain cover, and come running back to me.

 

I'm voting for "Border collies can be quirky". The second fear is one he developed when he was, I dunno, three years old. To my knowledge, the drain cover had never attacked him, nor had it made any sort of noise (at least that I could hear).

[gcv-border]

"go say hi to the monster", at which point he'll race down the hall, touch the drain cover, and come running back to me.

LOL!

 

Jovi

[KrisK]

My Cricket, will sometimes be afraid of the kitchen floor...there is no rhyme nor reason to when she will suddenly decide the floor is scary. I can't be much help, but yes indeed, they can be quirky dogs!

[urge to herd]

I've heard this kind of behavior called superstitious, which is a great way to think of it. A scary/painful thing happened to me when the door slammed. Therefore, every time the door slams, something scary/painful is about to happen to me again. Kinda makes sense.

 

What I've been advised to do is make that room or area the Best Thing That Ever Happens for the dog. Treats only appear in that room, the favorite toy only appears in that room, etc. You re-frame the association of scary/painful to WOW - I get SHOWERED with TREATS when I approach the kitchen!!!!

 

Depending on the dog, you may want to be a little more low-key with it. You should also be able to fade the treat or what have you when the dog is comfortable. You do want to randomly toss a treat or pull out the favorite toy from time to time in the area, to keep the dog believing that good things happen there, you just have to keep trying!

 

Ruth and Agent Gibbs

[rufftie]

something similar happened to us. I was swatting a fly in the kitchen with a dish towel near hobbs (near, but not that near). he panicked and ran from the room. he was loathe to come in again. it took awhile of "all good things come from the kitchen" to bring him around, but he's gotten over it. it's a plus that our favorite door to the outside is in the kitchen!

[Beach BCs]

Two of my dogs are afraid of staplers and 3 hole punches, but only at home. Tex came to work with me for three months last year. At work I use the stapler often. Zero reaction. At the house I have no idea why they are afraid. No one has ever stapled or 3 hole punched them and my stapler sounds very much like a clicker. Quirky things.

[B Point]

My little guy is afraid of one pot....only one! If he sees it he won't come in the kitchen. Any other pot...not a problem. And, they are all stainless steel and the same brand. Weird, huh?

[mbc1963]

My childhood dog used to run out of the kitchen and hide under a bed when my mother took out the frying pan. Why? Because some very rare times, the frying pan led to smoke which led to the smoke-detector noise. Ditto when my mother took out a new jar of mayonnaise or similar jar - because my mother was going to whack the cover upside-down on the counter to loosen it. I suppose Dusty was acutely aware of the kitchen environment because it was the most interesting (foody) room in the house.

 

Mary

[border_collie_crazy]

eh Gypsy is afraid of the kitchen at work, same reason, a banging dish. she didn't react at all when it happened, didn't startle, didn't run no reaction at all....except that ever since she will NOT come in the kitchen. previous to this everytime I was in the kitchen she was throwing herself against the door trying to get in with me, now I have to coax her in with a cookie just so I can feed her her supper, then she books it the heck outa there! its been about 2 weeks now of giving her a cookie everytime she comes in the kitchen, and feeding her supper in there, and nothing bad happening and she is still wont come within 5 feet of either kitchen entrance on her own. def. a dog thing , because Gypsy ain't a BC lol

[GentleLake]

It's definitely a dog thing, but I think BCs (and quite possibly certain other breeds) are more prone to it than others, just as noise/thunder phobia is more common in BCs than other many dogs.

 

Purely anecdotal -- definitely not a large enough sampling to make draw any conclusions -- but my BCs have definitely shown more of these quirky fear issues than my non-BCs or even BC mixes.

[loggerboots]

Thanks Folks, turns out her "fear" is of plastic baggies. I know, wth? Maybe she associated it with the loud noise my daughter was making, maybe not, not sure. All I know is when I take out a ziplock baggie, she runs away. I started keeping her treats in the bags and she'll stick around for those, so I don't think this one will be hard to cure, now that I know what it is. She's a love, but definitely quirky