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Calming Your Four-Legged or Feathered Companion

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The Global Pet Expo at the Orlando Convention Center featured over 1,000 exhibitors in over 3,000 booths showcasing 13 football fields worth of pet products. Pet anxiety and the various ways to calm our four-legged and feathered friends was an emerging topic this year.

Janet Marlow founded Pet Acoustics, which creates species' specific music to minimize an animal's anxiety by seeing how sound triggers their behavior.Marlow said the idea behind pet specific music came to her when she was trying to soothe her own cat.

"As a matter of fact my entire company Pet Acoustics started because of my pet Osborne. It’s a little bit of a sad story, but I’m so grateful to him. We had him for 15 years and he was injured in our woods, and I took him to the vet," said Marlow. "Now, I was a recording artist for many years. So I went to sing to him everyday at the vet, and I was amazed there was no music, the doors were slamming, and the phones were ringing. And for an animal that’s a lot of stress and you could see his eyes would close and he would be so soothed by the music."

She also explained how animals hear differently from one another.

"Yes, dogs and cats, and I’ve done 20 years of clinical studies and we’re also veterinarian approved, it’s species’ specifics so dogs and cats prefer long sustained tones and long phrases. Horses are rhythmic creatures. They actually walk in 2-4 3-4 and 4-4 time. So, the music is very heavy in rhythm, and short melodies," said Marlow.

30 rows over from Pet Acoustics, Vicki Rae Thorne of Earth Heart displays Canine Calm Aromatherapy Wipes. Thorne said the idea stemmed from a solution to her own problem.

"I started formulating essential oil remedies 25 years ago and it was for pain and stress for myself because I had been diagnosed with fibromyalgia. My business actually started for massage products for pain and stress," said Thorne. "In 2000, a kennel came to me and said, “Can you do something for my dogs?” And I said, “Yeah”, not knowing if I can."

In between the Calming Wipes and Pet Acoustics, a pheromone releasing solution resembling a plug-in air freshener is on display. Sarah Batterson, H&C Animal Health, said their product Feliway mirrors the natural pheromones that the cat gives off.

"So, it gets kind of a snout full of the pheromones in the air, and then it goes into their brain, and produces the same kind of pheromones that they give off naturally," said Batterson.

"So, it basically makes everything in the house, to them it marks it as a safe place. So, they kind of calm down, they’re not having their fear-induced behavior. They’re not scratching, urine spraying, hiding, or you know acting a little bit crazy,” said Batterson.

Batterson added that around 80% of dogs and cats in shelters are there because of stress behavioral problems, and her product aims to make every place a safe place in the home for your pet.