Vet visits are frightening to most dogs, and we can’t blame them.
Most of the time, dogs can sense what the other animals leave behind vet clinics – and these usually are smells of all sorts; these could be animal feces, vomit, animal smells, and even blood.
Canines could even ‘smell’ the fear and terror of other animals in the clinic.
With all these unpleasant smells and sights, a dog usually registers the vet clinic as a place of terror almost immediately on his first visit. And if a pet had had unpleasant previous experiences with the vet, i.e., a painful injection, he might equate every vet visit with pain and unpleasantness.
Vet clinics might seem harmless to us, but dogs often see these places as scary.
If you have a dog who is a ‘scaredy cat’ when it comes to vet visits, you might have seen how he reacts whenever you mention a vet visit to him. Like some dogs, he might oppose it almost instantly – and this refusal to go to the vet could take in many forms.
He might get agitated – destroy things or run in circles. He might even try to run and hide – away from you.
Of course, dogs express their disapproval and fear of vet visits in varying degrees. Some even get extra creative at it, while some react strangely out of fear.
Take, for instance, the little dog in the video, see next page:
