Welcome to a new series of blogs about body behavior! Each week will feature a new emotion and will tell you how it’s shown in your dog. Today’s emotions are happiness and excitement.
Looking at a dog’s face can show you plenty of signs of what they’re feeling. Dogs feeling happy or excited will have a soft, open mouth like our sweet buddy Beamer shown in the first photo. “Soft eyes” in dogs can also demonstrate happiness, which can refer to a loose gaze, relaxed eyelids and normal sized pupils. Ears can also demonstrate happiness in their relaxed or neutral state but will look different between each dog since they can be floppy or slightly lifted. The closer a dog’s ears are to their neutral state, the happier a dog is in respect to the rest of their body language.
Moving onto a dog’s body, we will continue with soft and relaxed features, which can look like loose, wiggly movements and a “helicopter tail” spinning in circles. It’s important to remember that all tail wagging means a dog is emotionally aroused but doesn’t always mean their happy. A wag that moves with their whole body is a sign of excitement, but a straight, fast tail wag is not. Many people also know the “play bow” as a sign of excitement where a dog is arched with legs out in front and their behind in the air ready to play with a human or other dog. Our lovely Scarlet is seen in the second photo ready to play with her siblings.
Generally, a happy or excited dog will show softer features all around their body, but it’s important to analyze the rest of their behavior to truly decipher what they are feeling. Keep up with next week’s blog about nervousness, another very important emotion to recognize in your dog!