Do dogs have a sense of time?

[eolight]

Do dogs have a sense of time?

I used to have a pomeranian which had a great sense of time.
For example, whenever I returned home after a long trip, the affection / enthusiasm was very visibly propotional to the amount of time I was away.

Now I have a doberman, and dont see the same sense of time awareness.
Being away for a day gets me the same enthusiasm as being away for a month (or year).

What experiences have you had with your dog(s)?

[NewfieGrl]

I do think dogs get to know your schedule. If you work from 9-5 daily they will have a sense of when you will be home. I think the way they react to that can be very different for each dog, however. I get the same reaction from Dublin(my newf) and Toby(my cocker spaniel). They are both happy to see me, but in a mellow way. But with Koda,(my newfie pup) it doesn't matter whether I'm gone for 2 minutes or 5 hours, he goes nuts when I come back. He definately has a different personality also. He is my little tag along and follows me from room to room to room. Dublin was always more relaxed in that area.
Michele
owned by 2 Newfies, a cocker spaniel and 3 cats.

[rstowe]

My dogs know when it is dinner time; they will get antsy until we feed them. They also know when I'm supposed to be home from work; they will sit by the front door and start to whine if I'm not home at the right time and will be confused for hours if I come home early.

[BrinkleyBing]

Heera knows when the feeding time is. We do not allow her in our bedroom anymore because she would wake my hubby up 1/2 hr before 7am....their lunch time.
She starts acting silly...and start brushing against me...1/2 before 5pm....dinner time. Once I feel asleep in the afternoon past 5pm...she woke me up!!
Brinkley on the other hand, will wait for ever for food or to pee/poo. He lets us know when he needs to pee/poo, but will never make a fuss about it. If we are not careful with the feeding routine...one won't notice if a meal is skipped & Brinkley is starving!! He is such a precious pup..:).

Brinkley & Heera both stare at the door when it's time for my hubby to come home from work. If he is late...they sit by the pet gate and stare at the door. If he is on a business trip...they still stare at the door everyday at that hour of the day!!
Sorry about the long post folks!! Can't get enough of bragging about my babies...:D

[Shiner's Mom]

Our Puppy PreSchool teacher says that they have a biological clock that is correct within an hour. I thought she was full of it until the other day. 20 minutes before my husband was due home (he comes home at roughly the same time every day) Shiner started looking out the window all of a sudden. Might have been a coincidence, but it made me wonder!

[LadyPirate]

Lucy definitely knows when it is time for my hubby to come home. She begins whining, going to the door, checking to see if I'm following. If I don't follow, she comes in and hits me with her nose and runs back to the door. She wants to go outside and sit on the porch and watch for him! That's all well and good in the warmer weather, but we are going to have a real problem when it begins to get cold!! LOL!

Robyn

[Grissomsmom]

Grissom definately knows the time...every morning at 5:30, it's time to go outside NOW!! hehehe and about 9pm he starts looking at his kennel longingly. Also I swear my cats can read the clock on my microwave. Before I got my doggie alarm clock (Grissom), if I overslept and wasn't up by 7am (even on the weekends) they would come claw and scratch and bang on my door!! "Mommy, are you okay? Why aren't you up yet? Don't you know if you don't work, we don't eat? Hellloooo??":D

[tinkerbell21]

Our cocker spaniel tells time wonderfully. He knows that my brother comes home from work at about 8:45 am and will stand at the front door waiting or sit in the recliner and stare out the window looking down the street. If its later than 8:45 he gets paranoid and starts paceing. He does this on Saturday and Sunday, trying to figure out why my brother never comes home--he doesn't work weekends. At about 7 pm he will hop into the recliner and look down the street within 5-10 minutes or less my dad will pull into the driveway. My neighbor across the street gets home around 5 every night, my dog waits for him to pull into his driveway. And at 9 pm everynight Toby goes into the front closet and brings out all of his toys one by one. If the door is closed he will try his best to paw it open--if unsuccessful he comes to me and sits down and puts his head on my lap, wanting the door open. He knows that the mailman (who he hates with every ounce of his being) comes around 2:00 pm He will check the mail slot--stand on his back feet and noses the mail slot. He rarely misses the mailman but when he does he goes and smells the mail slot--like he knows he came and he missed him. My dog is crazy.

[Grissomsmom]

Sounds like your dog has a very busy afternoon!

[eolight]

I guess most dogs have a biological sense of daily clock.

What about the general awareness of time?
In my case for example, one of my dogs was aware of the fact that I was away for a month.
The other was not.

Also by the amount of excitement it showed, it was obvious that it had differenciated between a month and a few days.
While the other one did not, or was not too happy to see me :)

[Maxspinel]

My Pom used to know the exact time. He would wait by the front door for my husband to come back at 5:00 pm. He would call my husband to dinner at 7:00 pm. He would whine and stand by the door for his daily walk by 9:00 pm. By 10:30 pm, he would dash into our bedroom and hide, hoping that we wouldn't find him and put him back to his area at night. He passed away two years ago.

My new pup is a maltipoo and she is one year old. She is developing some sense of time but no where near as acute as my Pom.

[Amanda B]

Fascinating topic here. We were gone 3 weeks on our honeymoon & missed Maltese soooooooo much. (At least after the 1st week) Our folks took care of her and stayed with her.
When we finally got home, we expected a frenzy of kisses...she wasn't that thrilled. She looked at us like, "Oh, you guys. What's up?"
I don't think she knows the difference between an hour or a month. Now that I work at home, I see what she was up to all those hours I used to be at my job and feel so guilty. She entertains herself, watches traffic outside, plays with the cat. Not the sad lonely girl I pictured. But, she is a maltese, and unlike bigger breeds. The bigger dogs probably get a little lonely. My best friends boxers are slowly destroying all her stuff cos' they get bored.
I love this site! So much fun!

[Evey]

Bailey, the dog I used to have, was accurate to within a few minutes. If, however, someone was to go out of town that person better be prepared to be "punished" when getting home. She would ignore you for a period of time roughly equivelant to the amount of time you had been away.