How stressful are flights for dogs?

[feesh]

We live in the Middle East and we rescued a dumped puppy a few months ago, who is now a splendid and rather fabulous 1-year old

I haven't had great success crate training her - she will go in there for her (raw) dinner, but she's never been happy in a crate and we never needed it for toilet training, so I don't lock her in it any other time. The only reason I am persisting with it is because I am conscious that she will have to go on a aeroplane at some point, assuming we move back to the UK eventually. She has an airline-style crate as a result of this expectation, and we are about to buy her a bigger one and make it a bit cosier now she is past the worst of the bedding-chewing stage.

It's always in the back of my mind that one day she will need to go in a plane, and I do worry about it a bit. She is quite a nervy dog and gets stressed sometimes when out on walks by strange noises and funny people etc. I have worked on her confidence a lot, but it is in her nature and breed type to be a bit nervy. I can imagine that she would totally freak out if we even took her to an airport for a walk around the place.

The dog rescue charity over here ship scores of neurotic dogs to Europe for rehoming every year without any problems, and plenty of expats bring dogs with them when they move out here, and none of them seemed to have any lasting issues from it, from the second they were let out of their crates.

But I am just so worried about my little baby (PFB!) going through it! I would also quite like to come back to England for the summer with her one year, maybe not this year, but possibly next year (it's quite common for there to be a massive expat exodus every summer to escape the heat!). I would love to take her back for holidays to run in forests and green grass.

Does anyone know just how stressful flights are for dogs? I know that they are forbidden by the regulations from having any kind of medication whatsoever before the flight, so you can't give them anxiety meds or anything like that. If it's a REALLY stressful thing, I would only ever put her through it once (when we eventually make a permanent move back to England) but if people think that it's not too hard on the dog, especially if they are really comfy in their crates, then I would definitely consider flying her to England once a year.

(By the way, if I knew we were definitely going to be flying her, I would get her 100% crate trained and crate happy in the months leading up to the flight, and I would also start crating her in the car when we go to the beach, so she'd get used to the sensation of the crate knocking about in a moving vehicle.)

Has anyone got any thoughts/tips for taking dogs on planes?

[noinspiration]

My parents flew a very nervy collie from UK to California without any problems. For the first few days after arrival he was clingy, and wouldn't leave mum's side, but no lasting effects. I think it is just a case of trying to keep calm and not stress about it for your dog's sake, as they will pick up on that.

[CydCharisse]

I don't think it's too stressful, but they do have to be happy in a crate, so I would work on that if I were you.

When my dog came home from Canada I had heard some horror stories from friends about airlines and pets so used a specialist animal shipping company. It speeds the trip up, because they are used to working with the airlines and DEFRA so can drop the dog off later than a 'normal' customer, and they pick the pets up directly from DEFRA airside at Heathrow. All this means less time in crate. so maybe look into that (all this was 4 years ago and things do change).

My dog was a bit jet lagged and confused but none the worse for wear after 24 hours ( and also he had been away from me for 6 mons so I'm sure that didn't help). The transit company said he had been complete calm at the airport etc.

By contrast, my cat who went out and back to Canada was totally enraged and disgusted with us both times!

[feesh]

Thanks both. In my head I know it's only a few hours and she would probably be fine, but it's hard to put your dog through something which would stress them out.

Do you think flying her back to England annually would mean shed eventually get used to it, or do you think doing it more often would actually make her more scared of it?

[feesh]

Apologies for lack of apostrophe!

[CydCharisse]

I think it depends very much on temperament. I have a friend who flies her little Jack Russell all over the world, several times a year. Ditto friends in Canada who regularly take pets back and forth by plane. None seem the worse for wear. However, I do know a couple of dogs who just couldn't be transported because they could not bear the crate for any length of time.

I'm no behaviourist. Someone else I'm sure can come along and tell you whether she'd be likely to get more or less afraid.

So I would sort the crate training thing. My experience is that if a dog is happy in a crate and they can be handled lovingly at each end, then it doesn't matter too much what happens in between. My own dog comes to France several times a year by ferry (so 6 hours on car deck crated in car) and it bothers him not one jot. I pop down to check on him and sometimes don't actually open the car up because I peep through the window and he is curled up fast asleep. :)