How prepared are you and your dogs for a natural disaster?

This came up big time for us a few months ago, when torrential rains did some serious damage to our town.  Here are some tips.

1. Depending on where you live, you might have to deal with earthquakes, floods, tornados, lots of rain, blizzards, lengthy power outages, etc., so how to prepare will be somewhat different. House fires can happen anywhere, as can some other reason to evacuate. Think about what possible scenarios you might encounter and what you would do.

2. Know how you would evacuate with your animals if you had to. This includes where their leashes are, if they would all fit in your vehicle or vehicles along with family members, how you could grab some dry food and drinking water quickly, etc. (Of course, there are all the other things you’d want to take anyway, like money or credit cards, some clothes, etc.)

3. Keep enough supplies on hand at home that if you couldn’t easily get to a store for a few days or more, you’d have all the food and other things you need.

4. The basics of dog training become even more important in a situation where unexpected events are happening and you need your dogs to do what you ask. Especially coming when called!

5.Likewise, the basics of socialization are essential if other people might be at your place, or you might be going out into the world.

So how did we score on the above checklist? Not as well as we should have! Kelly had the carburetor out of our little motor home, and I lay awake trying to picture two good-sized dogs, two cats, two people, plus some belongings in our VW Jetta, but it wasn’t going to happen. We were almost out of cat food and I walked into downtown to get it, after the streets were cleared enough that we could at least walk out. For #4 and #5, we were good.

[tags]disaster preparedness, dogs disasters[/tags]