🧠 Harvard Digs Up Dog Dreams

In Today’s Email:

• In your dreams! Canine sleep patterns debunked. 💤

• The New Wedding Season: “Man’s Best Friend” to “Best Man”?

• “The Squeeze” aka The Internet’s Best Dog News in 60 seconds.

• The Last Laugh: What we’re laughing with. Not at.

Your Dog’s Dreaming about You, So Hit the Snooze Button

Ever wish your dog “sweet dreams” before bed? Chances are they’re making good on that…by including you in them.

Recent scientific advancements are shedding light on the elusive realm of canine dreaming. A study published in the journal of Nature Neuroscience has delved into the depths of a dog's slumber, offering fascinating insights into what may occupy their sleeping minds.

We have questions.

Electroencephalography (say that three times fast) is the answer.

Dogs exhibit behaviors during sleep reminiscent of their waking experiences, such as twitching paws, wagging tails, and even emitting soft barks or growls. These observations led scientists to question whether dogs, like humans, engage in dreaming…

…and electroencephalography (EEG) technology enables them to study the electrical activity of the sleeping dog's brain.

The study found that dogs experience different sleep stages (like us), including rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, which is associated with dreaming in humans. During REM sleep, the researchers observed similar electrical patterns in dogs' brains as those seen in humans, indicating that dogs are likely engaged in dream-like mental processes.

The study involved training dogs to fetch a ball or navigate a maze. Upon entering REM sleep, the dogs' brain activity patterns closely resembled those observed while they were awake and engaged in the tasks.

Ipso facto: dogs reenact waking experiences in their dreams, offering a glimpse into their unique mental world.

So they dream about what they enjoy? Shocker.

Sure, but there are differences in dream content between dogs and humans.

While we experience vivid, visually detailed dreams, dogs rely on olfactory and auditory stimuli during their dream states. This aligns with dogs' acute sense of smell and hearing, indicating that their dreamscapes may be composed of scent trails, barks, and other sensory inputs.

Dr. Deirdre Barrett, a clinical and evolutionary psychologist at Harvard Medical School, has a thought: "Humans dream about the same things they're interested in by day, though more visually and less logically. There's no reason to think animals are any different. Since dogs are generally extremely attached to their human owners, it's likely your dog is dreaming of your face, your smell and of pleasing or annoying you."

Can I help my dog dream?

Yep. Dr Barrett says owners can try to improve their dog's dreams by exposing them to "happy daytime experiences" and providing them with a safe and comfortable environment to rest on a night.

If you’re offering your dog a pleasant quality of life, there’s a good chance you’re unknowingly aiding their sleep experiences…

…so can we calm their nightmares?

According to the American Kennel Club, you should never wake up a dog experiencing an obvious nightmare.

"It can be tempting to wake your dog to comfort her, as you would a child, but there are some risks associated with doggy nightmares. If you’ve ever been woken from a scary dream, you know that it can take a minute to remember where you are and whom you are with. dogs can react aggressively toward the person waking them. This can be dangerous, especially for children.”

As they say, let a sleeping dog lie…

…but we can’t lie: it’s pretty cool knowing that my dog’s remembering that piece of steak I gave him in la la land.

Overheard at a coffee shop:

“I have to get home soon. I leave the tv on for Taco, and he’s on season 4 of Game of Thrones. He’ll need me after the Stark wedding.”

“So, we’re not going out?”

- Fleet Coffee, Austin, Texas

A Canine Bridal Party? Best Man? Strap in, Wedding Season

The course of true love never did run smooth, said the bard Billy Shakespeare. What Shakespeare left out: pets smooth it out.

And so on the day of David Song and Marisa Savic’s wedding, gray clouds were threatening rain on their outdoor Bok Bar venue, two of the groomsmen ran late, and over in the reception staging area, the wedding planner had to spring into Plan B: The iceman did not cometh.

But one part of this nuptial was reliable: Mr. Ewok, the couple’s terrier.

Mr. Ewok was the ceremony’s “Best pooch” and “ring dog”. He was on time and looking fine in his navy and lime doggy tux, PetSmart coiffure, with precious wedding band cargo in tow.

Was Mr. Ewok prepped? Oh yeah.

Cue Bow Wow Weddings, a pet preparation service that gets Fido ready for your big day. They include:

• Free consultation

• Chauffeuring the dog to and from the venue

• personal attendant during the wedding (feeding, hydrating, walking, etc)

• overnight minder

You’re kidding. How much? The easy answer: $125/hr flat rate.

Is the market that large? Well, just ask WeddingWire, who surveyed over 800 pet owners to see how they fit "fur"ever love and forever love together.

Not surprisingly, many pet owners want pet owning to be part of their future. Nearly seventy percent (68%) of those surveyed indicated that marrying someone who owns or wants to own a pet is a "must-have.”

Of those surveyed, 38% said they included their pet in their wedding and/or engagement.

So, in comes Myles Ragin and Don Valentine, the co-founders of Bow Wow Weddings that saw a need for wedding weekend pet help. By the time the two fellow accounting majors at Robert Morris University were upperclassmen, the friends realized — a bit late, granted — that maybe they didn’t want to crunch numbers for the rest of their lives. So they told each other if the right business idea came along, they’d do it together.

It was lightning in a bottle. The Bow Wow Weddings idea had legs… and a tail.

Ragin and Valentine, both dog lovers, tailor their services to whatever couples need — photo assistance, including dressing dogs and wrangling them for the camera; ceremony help, like aisle escorting or minding them at the reception, and pet sitting the night before or after the wedding.

They have several packages, ranging from the Chihuahua (overnight pet sitting, plus photo, ceremony, and reception assistance) to the Great Dane for destination weddings. Their minimum charge is $350, and packages run from $599 to $1,299.

No one has asked yet, but they’d even pack a bag and help out on the honeymoon.

“A lot of people want their dogs involved, but I don’t think they realize, as a bride and groom, how busy you’re going to be and how much work your day is,” Ragin said.

Sometimes, having a dog around changes the feeling of the day. “Our clients wouldn’t have wanted it any other way,” say Ragin.

We can see that, you wedding warriors. We can see that.

“The Squeeze”: Dog News In 60 Seconds

• 💩 Pee-yew! Seattle was just named the “dog poo capital of the world” with the most owners leaving their pet’s “dookies” on the ground. Flush those grassy toilets!

• 🐝 Chance, a pit bull mix, was stung over 700 times by a swarm of bees. A blood transfusion is getting him back on his feet. We’re anointing him “The Bionic Dog”.

• 🏠 You’ll reconsider your next home renovation project after seeing this Victorian mansion built for two corgis.

• 🏈 The Cleveland Browns announced their two finalists for their new dog logo. They’ve never won a Super Bowl. This will surely get them there 🙄

• 😢 These are the 5 things that can hurt your dog’s feelings. Stop breaking hearts people…

• 🐻 Training your dog to chase… a bear? Believe it or not, it can save the bear. Karelian bear dogs are the new studs you need to know about.

• 📚 “Joey’s Two Legged Life” is a children’s book that spotlights a special needs dog. The books proceeds go to supporting an animal shelter.

• 👮 Sick of robot dogs? We aren’t either. The LAPD shelled out $278,000 for their newest, robotic, canine officer.

• 🐍 Ladies, scream this so the men in the back can hear: a dog just gave birth to 7 puppies after being bit by a rattlesnake. #girlsruleboysdrool

Today’s Last Laugh:

Psst! NFL! Sign this dog…