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Television madness

Rupert Barnes

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Evening, we have a rescue Collie now 2yrs old. He used to be fine with the TV then suddenly one night the clapping and so on from the Covid, on the news frightened him. Now we cannot have anything with any clapping/cheering AT ALL. This could be any gameshow, sport event, music, news or quiz show. You would be amazed how many times people clap/cheer on the TV in an evening, even if you try and avoid it. This can only be for a slit second and he will come from anywhere in the house to bark and spin at the TV. He spins around the room in the uncontrolled way, crashing into things without any care for them. He now waits for this sound and it has developed into barking and spinning at a more general level every time certain programs start and finish/ advert breaks. Sometimes we can watch most of an evenings TV (without clapping) and some nights we have a battle of sound on/off, shutting him in or out of the room irrespective of the program. If the programs is like a documentary/factual/news then he may watch for a while then calm down but as soon as he sees the TV menu on to change channel, he's ready just in case. If we turn the sound off he barks to get us to turn it on, this includes him nudging and stealing the remote. If we shut him out of the living room he barks to be let in and after his tea he sits in the living room waiting for us. I think he was originally scared by it but its now become learned behaviour and a massive rush. Once he has passed a certain point (very quickly) there is nothing we can do for the night. You get the general idea.

We have a radio on sometimes so he is used to other sounds in the house, music etc. We have tried playing programs on other devices at a low volume and and he goes mad even at the slightest trigger sound. We have tried playing games as a distraction and he stops instantly he hears something he likes on the TV.
 
I am sure others will come up with better solutions.... but my 2 cents are:
- the more he does this, the more of a habit this becomes
- 1st thing is to eliminate the trigger. No evening TV for a while
- then slowly reintroduce TV, if you still have cravings for it
 
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