How Does Daylight Savings Time Affect Your Dog?

It's that time of the year again, less time to walk our dogs in the daylight and the necessary searching for poo in the dark. For humans, the only benefit is an extra hour in bed, but what does it mean for our dogs?

Dogs thrive on routine; a happy dog is a dog with a set pattern. Have you ever noticed that they get stressed if you go past walkies time or one of their meals is late? Routine to dogs is the assurance that everything is ok.

The clocks going back can put this routine out of kilter for a couple of weeks until they get used to the new schedule.

If you get usually get up at 7 am, walk the dog and feed them by 8 am then the new schedule for your dog is getting up at 6 am and get their first meal by 7 am. Dogs' don't understand, and with a lot of dogs, this can cause problems that manifest themselves in the first week by:

• Losing interest in their food.
• Signs of stressful behaviour.
• Toilet accidents in the home.

You can counteract this by adapting to the new schedule slowly. We find increasing exercise time reduces stress and encourages your dog to eat normally.
If your dog does go off their food, do not replace it with something different, this can lead to extra stress.

Keep to the schedule and don't feel too guilty for that extra hour in bed.