How Do You Help a Pet Cope With Fireworks?

The first bang goes off somewhere over the rooftops, and the dog is suddenly glued to your leg. Or gone. Or lying very still under the kitchen table, panting.

If fireworks are days away and you have not prepared, skip ahead to the section on tonight. Everything else on this page can wait until you have got through this weekend.

Ready?

How Many Pets Are Actually Frightened of Fireworks?

If your dog hates fireworks, you are in very large company. Around half of dogs are at least partly frightened by them, and almost a third of owners say their dog’s welfare takes a serious hit (Riemer, PLOS One, 2019).

Fireworks are the most common noise fear in dogs. And the real number is probably higher.

Only a quarter of owners describe their dog as fearful of noises. Ask them about specific behaviours, though, and nearly half report at least one sign of fear (Blackwell and colleagues, University of Bristol, 2013).

In other words, a lot of frightened dogs are not being recognised as frightened.

It is not only dogs, either. Cats, rabbits and guinea pigs are all affected, and small animals kept outdoors are especially exposed, to the point where owners have lost guinea pigs to the stress of a nearby private display.

What Does a Frightened Pet Look Like?

Some pets make it very obvious. They tremble, pant, pace, hide, freeze, flatten their ears, tuck their tail or try to escape.

Others go the other way. Some become clingy, some toilet indoors when they are usually clean, and cats often vanish entirely.

The dog barking at the window is easy to spot. The dog lying very still under the kitchen table, panting, is often described as “fine”.

Is your pet actually fine, or just quiet?

That is exactly where owners tend to misread things. Silence is not the same as calm.

Learning the quieter signals, like lip licking, yawning when not tired or a tail held low, pays off well beyond November.

Our guide to reading dog body language when your dog is stressed or fearful walks through each posture in turn.

Fireworks Are Tonight and You Have Not Prepared. What Now?

Deep breath. Bring pets indoors before dusk and lock the cat flap, then close the curtains and windows and put the TV or music on to mask the bangs.

Set up a hiding place with familiar bedding. Stay in the house with them, keep your own behaviour normal, and let them hide if they want to.

That is the whole emergency list. None of it needs shopping for.

A few extra things help on the night. Walk dogs in daylight, well before anything starts, and feed a bit earlier than usual, because a frightened animal often will not eat once the noise begins.

Move rabbits and guinea pigs indoors, into a shed or garage. Cover part of the enclosure with blankets so they can burrow away from the sound.

Then check the collar tag and microchip. Frightened animals bolt, and a dog or cat that shoots through an open door is far more likely to come home if the chip is registered to your current address and phone number.

The microchipping rules for dogs and cats in the UK explain how to check and update the details in a few minutes.

If your pet hides, leave them there. Do not try to coax them out. They are doing exactly what they should be doing, which is finding somewhere they feel safe.

Should You Comfort a Frightened Pet or Ignore Them?

Comfort them. If your pet comes to you for reassurance, give it.

The idea that comforting a frightened animal rewards the fear is outdated and wrong. Fear is not a trick being trained, it is an emotional state, and being ignored by their person makes it worse.

The old advice is still doing the rounds, even on some local council pages.

Did anyone ever tell you not to make a fuss of your dog?

The major animal welfare charities now say the opposite. Stay nearby so your presence can calm them, never shout at a frightened animal, and cuddle and stroke them if that helps them relax.

So the rule is simple: follow your pet’s lead. If they want contact, give it. If they want to be under the bed, let them be under the bed.

What you do want to avoid is your own panic. Animals read us, and a worried owner confirms there is something to worry about, so keep your voice and movements normal.

Never punish a frightened pet. They cannot help it, and it will make next year worse.

Do Calming Products for Fireworks Work?

Every autumn the shelves fill up with diffusers, calming chews and little bottles of drops. Sadly, they do far less than the packaging suggests.

Pheromone diffusers, nutraceuticals, herbal products, essential oils, homeopathic remedies and Bach flower remedies all performed no better than you would expect from a placebo. And they are not cheap.

That does not make them harmful. It just means the basics and the training below will do far more than anything in a box.

If your pet’s fear is severe, have a conversation with your vet rather than a shopping trip. Vets can prescribe medication for noise fear and refer you to a clinical animal behaviourist.

Most owners never ask: only 36% of owners with firework-fearful dogs had spoken to a vet about it.

Can You Prevent a Pet Becoming Frightened of Fireworks?

Yes, and this is the best news on the whole page. Teaching a dog that noise means something good, before they ever develop a fear, works remarkably well.

Dogs trained this way as puppies coped best of all during fireworks. Untrained dogs were close to the other end of the scale.

The gap is enormous, and almost nobody does it. 74% of owners had done no preventative training at all.

Has your pet ever heard a firework outside of November?

Probably not, and that is precisely the problem. The only version of the noise most pets ever meet is the loud, sudden, real one.

It works in adult dogs too. Dogs trained as adults, before any fear had set in, did almost as well as those trained as puppies.

So if you have a two-year-old who has been fine so far, you have not missed the window. Starting now, in a quiet month, is worth more than anything you do on the night.

Here is how it goes. Play recorded firework sounds very quietly, quietly enough that your pet does not react, and pair them with something excellent like chicken.

Build the volume up over weeks, never to the point of a reaction. Free sound files are available from several UK charities, and if your pet reacts at any volume, you have gone too fast.

Does Firework Fear Always Get Worse?

No. Firework fear is not a one-way road.

Among affected dogs, around 39% improved over recent years, a third stayed the same, and around 26% got worse. Dogs whose owners had done some training were more likely to be in the improving group.

Even where owners had sought no advice at all, 30% of dogs improved and half stayed the same.

If your dog got worse last November and you have been quietly dreading this year, hold onto that. Getting worse is common, but it is not inevitable, and training tips the odds in your favour.

How Long Does It Take a Pet to Recover After Fireworks?

Most dogs are back to themselves by breakfast. Some shake it off straight away, roughly a fifth settle within half an hour, and around three-quarters are themselves again by the following morning.

For a minority it takes considerably longer. Around 10% need a full day, another 10% up to three days, and a small number need weeks or even months.

If your pet is still off several days later, not eating properly, or hiding when there is nothing to hide from, talk to your vet rather than waiting it out.

Which Pets Are Most at Risk?

If you have a crossbreed or a rescue, you may already have guessed the answer. Mixed-breed dogs show the highest levels of firework fear, followed by herding breeds, while retrievers and molossian breeds such as mastiffs are among the least bothered.

Rescue dogs also tend to be more affected than dogs bred and kept by their breeder.

None of that is destiny. Early socialisation matters as much as genetics, and a well-prepared crossbreed will cope better than an unprepared retriever.

Fear of fireworks also travels. A dog frightened of fireworks will usually be frightened of thunder and gunshots too.

Oddly, it does not go hand in hand with separation anxiety, or with fear of people or other dogs. Noise fear seems to be its own thing rather than a sign of a generally anxious animal.

Why Would a Dog Suddenly Become Scared of Fireworks at Seven?

Your older dog has sat through years of Bonfire Nights without a flicker, and this year they are shaking. That is worth a vet visit.

Noise-sensitive dogs with underlying joint or muscle pain tend to develop their fear years later than dogs without pain, at an average of 6.5 years rather than 2.7.

The thinking is that a sore body plus a startle is a worse combination than a startle alone.

Most firework fear starts young. 45% of affected dogs show it before their first birthday, and very few develop it after six.

So a sudden change in an older dog is worth mentioning to your vet. It may be nothing. It may also be the first sign of something sore.

What About Cats, Rabbits and Small Pets?

Keep cats in from before dusk with the cat flap locked, a litter tray out, and hiding places up high as well as down low. Bring rabbits and guinea pigs indoors or into a shed, with extra bedding to burrow into and part of the enclosure covered.

Cats mostly cope by disappearing, which is why their fear gets underestimated. A cat wedged behind the sofa is frightened, not fine.

Leave them there, keep the room quiet, and let them come out in their own time.

Flattened ears, a crouched body, a tucked tail and dilated pupils often come before any attempt to hide.

If you are unsure what you are looking at, cat body language signals and what a hiding cat is telling you covers the common ones.

For rabbits and guinea pigs, the real problem is being unable to get away from the noise. Extra hay and a part-covered enclosure give them somewhere to go.

Backyard displays are the ones owners dread most, and it is easy to see why. An organised display you can plan around. A neighbour’s garden on a random Tuesday you cannot.

When Do Fireworks Actually Happen in the UK?

If you think of it as one night in November, you are in for a surprise. Retailers without a special licence can only sell fireworks from 15 October to 10 November, in the three days before Diwali and Chinese New Year, and from 26 to 31 December.

So “getting through Bonfire Night” is the wrong way to think about it. It is closer to a six-week stretch, with another around New Year.

Current rules on times and permitted use are on the government’s fireworks page. They do change, so check rather than relying on what you remember.

Does Pet Insurance Cover Firework-Related Problems?

It depends on the policy and the problem. If your dog injures itself trying to escape, that is an accident and most policies would consider it.

Behavioural treatment is different. Some policies include a behavioural cover section, many exclude it entirely, and pre-existing behaviour problems are usually excluded.

If firework fear is something you are dealing with, check whether your policy has a behavioural section and what its limit is, because it varies enormously between insurers. Our guide to what pet insurance costs across UK providers covers how cover levels differ.

Cover for a behaviour problem your pet already has is unlikely on a new policy, which is the same pre-existing rule that applies to physical conditions.

What Should You Do Differently Next Year?

Start early, in a quiet month. Book a vet conversation well before October if your pet struggled this time, and begin sound training while nothing is happening.

Build the hiding place now so it is familiar rather than new. Check the microchip details. These are the things that really move the needle.

Behaviour plans work best started at least three to six months before firework season, with veterinary advice sought six to 12 weeks ahead (Blue Cross).

Which means the month to act on this is somewhere around May, when fireworks could not feel further away.

Will you remember in May?

Put it in your calendar now. Future you, in a fortnight, will be glad.

And if this year is already a write-off, that is alright. Get through the next few weeks with the curtains shut and the telly on, then start properly in the spring.

Firework season is short, but the problems it causes are not always. If you are reviewing pet insurance before November, check how your policy handles behavioural referrals, because that varies a good deal between providers.