To not get the problem with fireworks and pets

[SoldTheMovieRights]

There's fireworks going off next door but one and I can hear them, but just some small popping noises really and barely audible when we had the telly on earlier.

It's never been loud enough to wake or disturb DC.

However, local Facebook group for my village is full of posts complaining about fireworks and how they are traumatising pets. AIBU to not get it? If they are too quiet to disturb people why are they so bad for dogs (who would all be inside in the evening anyway?)?

Lots of people wanting them banned because of their dogs but I just don't get it, at worst it's a few mins of noise, a few nights a year, is it really that awful?

I have zero skin in the game as could never be bothered to do fireworks myself, but if my neighbours fancy it, crack on, I'll enjoy the show.

They're awful. Horrible for the environment, polluting, damaging to wildlife, traumatizing to pets and many people who have experience and memory of explosions. Personally, my 2 cats aren't bothered - they've never seemed to register them and are always curfewed at sunset regardless - but loads of animals are.

You sound woefully ignorant. Just because the fireworks in your area are just small popping noises doesn't mean that they sound like that in other areas. My last dog was terrified of them and would shake and hide under the table, and the local Facebook page always has posts about dogs who have run away. They sound loud enough to me btw - maybe you should get your hearing checked!

This year it sounds like the place is being shelled. I've never heard fireworks this loud.

Wtaf. I hope this was a goady post, because otherwise, a 10-second Google search could have solved this mystery for OP.

I’m so glad that fireworks are just “little pops” where you are, OP, but in general, fireworks can reach 160 decibels. That’s the equivalent to having a jet engine 100 yards away from you.
www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/how-to-block-fireworks-noise/

We also know that dogs are sensitive to sounds we can’t hear. They can hear sounds that are “invisible” to us in the -5 to -15dB range. Now imagine how loud 160 dB is for them. I mean, a lot of dogs are scared of vacuum cleaners - how much more scary must fireworks be, when they can hear the noise but can neither see nor understand the cause.
https://www.akc.org/expert-advice/lifestyle/sounds-only-dogs-can-hear/

There’s just no argument here. Many animals have died from stress (or after running away from stress), and if you didn’t hear about “the zoo stuff” years ago… well. Years ago, people still thought it was okay if zoos were made up of cages just barely big enough for the animals. It was never publicly announced when animals died of this treatment.
Just a single case of a dog dying from fireworks stress, here in the UK:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cze8yldj25eo.amp

The problem is that the very loud fireworks that were banned around 25 years ago seem to have come back in the last couple of years.

If you've not experienced these, which also make the house shake, then you're very lucky .
But you'd have to be a bit thick to not believe so many people when they say it frightens their pets as its a real problem that will likely be a lot harder to control now it's so much easier to buy shit from China.

You'd hope that a silver lining in the cloud that is the CoL crisis is that fewer people are willing and able to mindlessly set fire to so much money but apparently not.

Australia banned home fireworks decades ago. Only licensed companies can arrange displays now, in open safe places. That's why our councils put on such great displays.
Fireworks were banned as there were too many terrible accidents and fires, and way too many bloody idiots hurting themselves, others and animals. Even now the sound of displays can cause pets to run away if not contained properly, and stress-out city-dwelling wildlife, like Flying Foxes.

www.instagram.com/reel/DS6SDuREkAO/

Lucky you that you don't have autism or PTSD then.

One of the big problems is that they are completely unpredictable. It's not just a few hours over one night. It's the days/weeks on either side of the event. Can you not see how this can be unsettling for someone?

I grew up somewhere where fireworks are banned. That meant they only went off on one night (police pretty much ignored private displays). Much easier to manage issues, be it a pet or a person's, if you know what to expect.

Our dog isn’t bothered by them. Our old cat was absolutely terrified of fireworks. Shaking and drooling with fear. We’d keep him in if we knew fireworks were happening….but you don’t always know. I think fireworks should be confined to professional displays.

I had the tele on last night.

it’s our first new years in this house.

I have never in my life (and I am in my 50s) heard fireworks so loud. The booms went right through me. And there were so so many for hours. They started at between 3 and 4 pm when it wasn’t even dark and they didn’t stop until 2am. They were constant from midnight to about half one.

thankfully my pet isn’t bothered but the dog next door is frightened of them and has to be doped to the eyeballs.

They started at 10.30 tonight other home fireworks every hour for around 30 minutes. In urban area so not near neighbours and come from all directions. Last lot started at 2.30. Very loud bangs woke my children up constantly so awful sleep. Will be awful for pets and I don’t agree it’s trainable for many/most/all

I’m a hypocrite as have been to friends bonfire parties but if they were restricted to formal displays I wouldn’t be sad.

Animals have far more sensitive hearing than we do

Well, it doesn't just go on a few minutes the noise does it? Last night some fanny couldn't tell the time for New Year and fireworks were going off consistently from 10pm! It's customary to wait til 12am as the New Year begins. But hey ho...

And I wasn't seeing in the New Year but was woken up by the noises of the fireworks. My own dig doesn't bat an eyelid about fireworks but we have just been lucky. Pets have sensitive hearing and many get distressed.

I think it’s a combination of a few things. Yes, I believe fireworks have got louder or the proliferation of the noisier ‘airbomb’ style firework has increased. Additionally, I think the periods throughout the year of typical firework use has dramatically extended compared to the 80’s/90’s when I was a child. Nowadays on top of NYE, there’s a window of around a fortnight during October/November when fireworks will be getting set off. These can be organised events or just people in their back garden letting them off on any day and at any time, with no warning, the fireworks ranging from a handful of isolated, mild whistler rockets to hourlong barrages of ear splitting air bombs.

I also think society in general has become more aware of, and sensitive to, animal welfare vs when I was a child. Back then not only would the impact of fireworks on animals have been considered less important, it would also certainly have been less well widely known and discussed - there was no easy access to the internet or any social media platforms to enable the easy sharing of people’s thoughts/issues/concerns on the subject.

From my perspective, of my 3 dogs, 2 are entirely unbothered which is great, but does nothing to compensate for the 1 who is left shaking, panting, salivating and cowering in a corner for days and weeks on end. Yes, we use dog ear muffs and a snood, yes we play soothing music, yes we’ve tried calming plug ins and desensitising in the weeks/months leading up to Bonfire night….sadly none of these things really help. We even looked into meds from the vet but these can only be taken for 2-3 consecutive days, which is no good when fireworks are being let off with no warning.

I don’t object to people enjoying fireworks to mark certain occasions throughout the year and actually wouldn’t want to see them banned completely. I do however struggle to understand why they need to be so loud, especially those made available for members of the public to buy. Either reduce the maximum decibels for them or restrict them to usage at planned, organised events.

How do you train them out of not being afraid?

My dog isn't afraid of fireworks, but he's terrified of thunder. He thinks he's going to die, shakes from head to toe and gets diarrhea for 24 hours after. It's got so bad that he's actually afraid of rain on windows or a change in atmosphere because he's realised these things are associated with thunder.

It seems to be a fear he's grown into, I don't remember him being so afraid as a puppy.

I'd love to know how to train him out of it? I did try playing recordings of the sounds at ever increasing volume, but it's not the same, he knows it's not a thunderstorm as there's no change in the atmosphere.

In an actual thunderstorm I drug him now, but I can't drug him every time in rains- he's an otherwise completely healthy non-anxious dog.

JFC, I live next door to a school that does a firework display every November. It’s horrendous. I have to shut every blind and have Alexa playing music throughout the house. You can still hear the bang bang bang in every room. The cats hide away under the beds in the middle of the house. It’s like being in the middle of a battle.

nah, no idea what all the fuss is about 🙄

How do they train guide dogs and police dogs for this?

Bullshit about training dogs to be OK with fireworks.
We had a spaniel that started his working life as a service dog, detecting land mines. Had a stint in the prison service aa a drug sniffer, and then was my DPs gun dog.
Never a problem when he was working. Was desensitised as part of his training.
Absolutely terrified of fireworks, to the point he would soil himself, and get injured throwing himself at doors.
If they were restricted to well advertised controlled displays pet owners could take action to help minimise the distress.
I live in a village, back yard fireworks started at 4.30 yesterday, there was an organised display 3 miles away that started at 11.50pm and went on for half an hour. Shook my house. There was dogs barking and howling.
One of our dogs doesn't care, the other gets distressed. I've got horses too. I can't be in two places at once. I can't keep my animals sedated for days/weeks at a time.
I've been bolted with because someone let off a rocket in broad daylight when I was riding past. That horse never quite got over it, to the point that after many years of competing he'd lose the plot if spectators were clapping.
I don't think fireworks will ever be banned, but I think the noise levels should be reduced, and confined to controlled displays.

What is the point of your post? Are you saying you don't believe that dogs hearing is more sensitive to humans? Its a biological fact. It doesn't have to be loud. Just a few distant pops are enough for a dog to cower and shake with fear. They sometimes seem so scared it looks like they will die. It's really scary for an owner. Just look at that article where a baby panda actually died. A simple google and you would have found out that animals being more scared than humans is actually a thing. Maybe do that instead of making goady posts and doubling down on your ignorant opinion.

As a Hindu living in an urban area (so nothing to do with farms) I still do all my fireworks for Diwali. I finish at the legal time.

If a few pets get scared, it doesn't bother me.

I’ve currently got two rescue dogs; hunting/working breeds; from a country where the treatment of these beautiful sensitive souls by their hunter “owners” would break even the hardest anti-dog heart.
My younger one carries noise trauma like I’ve never encountered before. Anything even vaguely reminiscent of a gunshot outside and he’s in absolute bits. Shaking, panting, drooling, heart going like the clappers I genuinely worried that he was actually going to have a heart attack when we lived in our old area which was like fecking Beirut from Halloween until NY. He used to pee himself where he laid too. I’m taking it as a massive win that he no longer does that.

Weve tried calming remedies, T-touch wraps, sedation, you name it, we’ve done it - alongside spending the 8 years we’ve had him working on desensitisation. Gunshot noise on the TV is now tolerated with minimal reaction but if he hears the noise outside, or even worse he is outside when it happens (eg bird scarer) he is an absolute wreck. I’ve seen dogs unsettled by it before but this is a whole different ball game.
And one that it takes weeks to recover from. It’s not like he wakes up the next day and is fine, the fear and hyper-alertness takes weeks to settle down from.

Do you understand how acoustics work?
The fireworks will sound louder in a built up area as the sound has more hard surfaces to bounce off.
Plus more frequent. If you heard a gunshot that would be scary.
If you heard multiple gunshots at random intervals, that would be more scary.

YABU not to understand that an animal has more sensitive hearing and don’t understand it’s a firework.
Fireworks generate too much money, they’ll never be banned. I find it strange that humans enjoy them, loud bangs, bright lights… let alone be willing to spend so much money on them. Very odd.