Here are some more ideas to calm your lonely dog when you're gone.
1. Beg, borrow or buy an auto-reverse tape recorder. It plays the tape over and over all day. Make a 15 minute tape of you talking to your dog in a pleasant reassuring way. Use his name a lot. Play this tape when your dog is home alone. You could even include the whole family's voices.
2. Set up some outside activities. Suspend a ball or tire on a rope or a bungee cord hung over a tree branch. Teach your dog to bat it around. Gather some empty refrigerator boxes and make a tunnel. Teach your dog to run through it.
Find a neighbor who has a friendly lonely dog and get them together, at first on neutral territory. Maybe they can play together while you're gone.
Use your imagination and make your environment novel and interesting for your pets. They deserve it and it will save your house and yard from destruction. Bored lonely dogs are destructive dogs and who can blame them?
Woofs and Wags,
Carole
Do you have a question for Carole? You can reach her at the email address listed on her resume. Perhaps she will use it in an upcoming article on this Web site.