New research shows that even pets get the blues during that time of year when the Earth is tilted away from the sun’s direct intervention. The waning light of winter certainly yields more depressive incidents among the human population—why not our pets?
The study, however flawed, at least shows that people consider their pets to be depressed during these months. They report greater indolence, increased sleep time and less of an appetite. I question its merits only because true Seasonal Affective Disorder is difficult to establish among humans, let alone their pets. After all, pets may well rest more as all mother nature’s creatures tend to do when faced with a diminished opportunity for play or prey time.
Our anthropomorphic sensibilities clearly make way for our observation of quiet winter time as depression, when it might, in fact, be a mere storing of energy, by way of augmented fat reserves, for the busy months to come. Bears, whales and penguins do it, why not our pets, too?
More interesting, however, is the possibility that the sense we humans perceive as depression, even within our own selves, is heightened by our natural tendencies towards the same. This makes more sense for those living in Fairbanks, Norway or upper Minnesota than for folk like me living in winterless Miami.
It’s clear from a multitude of studies that melatonin and other dwindling-light-related hormones push us in the direction of quiet contemplation perhaps ill-suited to humanity. Why else the suicidal tendencies observed in Northern latitudes? Genetics? Perhaps it’s accountable for mental illness in some populations, but why then the cure with the influx of natural light after the same individuals move southwards?
Pets must surely feel the same as we do to some extent. They, too, are affected by many of the same mammalian hormones. Does that mean that pets are “happier” in southerly climes?
I don’t have an answer, but I do know that SAD exacts a decided toll on humans. It’s then reasonable to believe that pets whose breeds are more acclimated to equatorial regions might be more susceptible to the insinuation of this disorder. But who knows? IMO, studies in this vein only as good as the humans who rank their pets’ behavior in two different climactic zones over a period of years.
Hence, we may never know how many licks I takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop.
