Here is the fundamental issue: Most dogs do not like to be forced to go out to do their business when it is raining. Even dogs that love to swim and fetch things in water don’t usually appreciated water falling on them from above. It’s a totally different sensation than leaping joyfully into the water for a lovely swim or to retrieve a favorite stick. But neither you nor they really like big messes left on the carpet. They are highly embarrassed because they know it’s against the rules, and they very much want to please you. You, of course, don’t want to clean up the mess. So. They need to go out, but often neither of you are very happy about it. Even when my husband and I were still living in our house, our dog Zoe refused to go potty in the rain even if we forced her out the back door. She would spend her whole time huddling under the eaves for shelter, no matter how long we left her out there. We tried not giving her breakfast until she had gone potty. Even that didn’t work. I would always end up having to put a lead on her and take her out. With the lead on, she didn’t have much choice but to follow me and once outside, she did indeed attend to business. Eventually, after we had had her for awhile, we didn’t even try to force her out into the back yard. I would simply suit up with my rain gear and take her out for a walk.
Years later, as many of you know, my husband and I moved back to the Bay Area of Northern California and into a 22 floor retirement community. All of us in the building who have dogs need to take them for walks both for exercise and to give them the chance to go to the bathroom. Also, as many of you know, after my husband died, friends in the building who have a labradoodle, and I who have a miniature Schnauzer, started sharing the 3 walks a day of our dogs. (See the 2 preceding posts below.)
When it’s not raining, I walk the dogs anywhere from 0.5 – 1.5 miles in the afternoon. That gives them plenty of time to do their business. When it’s raining I tend to stay close to the apartment so I can get home quickly if needed, but I still need to give the dogs enough time for multiple chances to go potty. Taking some photos along the way keeps us all moving a little, which also helps.
The particular afternoon of yesterday (see post below), it had been raining for hours with no signs of letting up, and my phone said it was going to continue to rain for at least 120 more minutes. About 4:00 I finally figured there was no sense in waiting any longer, especially since at the moment it wasn’t raining terribly hard. The dogs and I went out. We stayed out about 15 minutes. I took some photos, they did what they were supposed to do. We all came home and dried off,
And no more than 15 minutes later? You guessed it: the sun came out in all its glory. The dogs, of course, being inside, didn’t realize that the rain had stopped so soon after our walk. Which was probably a good thing, as they are both very good at looking at me reproachfully. Also, thank goodness, dogs tend to live in the moment, so they probably wouldn’t have had something to say about it. But still………
Sigh. At least I got some good photos. (For more photos from the walk, see yesterday’s post below.)
Zebra's Child 