Fear of Fireworks? Slow Densitization.

My female Akita, Yuki, is terrified of fireworks. She is going to be 5 years old in a few days, and 3 years ago she suddenly began displaying a fear of fireworks.

Like many dogs, the 4th of July is challenging for Yuki. She will disappear into a room, shaking, and she will hide, despite no way to escape the sound.

Kinjo has no such fear. Last year my neighborhood had a large fireworks display out back and Kinjo sat out there with me and was completely unbothered.

What I have been doing is playing a YouTube video of firework sounds and images. I start the volume really low to where Yuki is unbothered by it. When she is relaxed and in a calm state of mind, I slowly increase volume until I notice a change in her behavior. I'll stop the volume where it is and wait for her to return to a relaxed state of mind. Once she does, I'll reward her with affection or a treat. After a bit of this, I slowly begin increasing the volume until I got another reaction and repeated the process. I do this every day with her to condition her to relax around the sounds.

I will do this daily with her over several weeks.