I’ve never had a dog who easily adjusted to the time change, especially the change at this time of year, when the clock moves back an hour. We’ve always had dachshunds, and they’re real chow hounds. Not quite as extreme as beagles, but close. Their bio clocks know when it’s dinner time, and they refuse to listen to me when I tell them it’s “really” an hour earlier than they think it is.
We have a new adoptee that we’ve had for a little over a month, and Max is the same as all our previously adopted doxies. He doesn’t understand the time change one little bit.
Has anyone had any luck with techniques to help a dog adjust to the time change?
I’ve tried sitting down and explaining it the night before when we go to bed. I’ve tried explaining it in the mornings. I’ve tried showing her the clock and saying “see - it says it’s too early for breakfast.”
She still doesn’t have a full understanding of “Standard Time” and why we’re not getting up already.
I frequently work from home. The dog knows when it’s time for the lunchtime walk and when it’s time to close the laptop and spend time with him. Today he sat and stared at me with a look of “it’s time”.
It’s a little late for your advice, Beck, but I’m going to feed him a little early today and taper back to the “regular” dinner time over the next week.
Instead of trying to explain it to the dog, I think you should let the dog explain it to you, which would go roughly as follows: “Time changes are artificial and stupid – probably something invented by scheming cats. They’re total bullshit and should be ignored. I give you a lot of love and don’t ask for much in return. Feed me on time. It’s not much to ask.”
If it’s really really inconvenient you might try gradually weaning him to the new schedule, say by making it 10 or 15 minutes later each day. But otherwise, why bother? You’ll just be faced with the opposite problem in the spring.
ETA: There were only two posts in this thread when I originally wrote this but got distracted and didn’t hit “Post”. I see that others have the same idea about making the adjustment gradually.
My grandmother grew up on a dairy farm and hated Daylight Savings Time; the cows still have to be milked at the same time regardless of what the clock says.
The problem isn’t standard time; it’s DST. Next year when DST begins, don’t feed the dogs when the clock says it’s time; feed them at what would have been their feeding time on Standard Time (so if they ate at 5:00 Standard time, feed them at 6:00 DST).
That’s hilarious! Especially the little dog on the right.
Reminds me of a joke, or a true story, not sure which.
When told the reason for daylight saving time the old Indian said…
‘Only a white man (pale face, or the govt.) would believe that you could cut a foot off the top of a blanket and sew it to the bottom of a blanket and have a longer blanket.’
We used to have a cat that came into our room the same time every morning before we got up. She automatically adjusted for time change.
The closest thing to a logical explanation I can come up with is she was looking at the clock on the cable box, which was the only one back then that auto adjusted. But that is a stretch.
We’re sitting a dog, the daughter of our old dog. Food is not a big problem, but she gets up early anyhow and with the time change she gets up even earlier. Most days she goes over and nuzzles my wife and I feel guilty and get up with her at 5 am. Even if you convince the dog to go back to bed then you’re awake. To make it worse, the dog eats and then goes to sleep in the living room.
My dogs don’t like it cause they get screwed out of their Jeep ride frequently. Gets dark too early and I got shit to do. But they get to hang out by the woodstove more often, so there is that.
