Although dogs don’t communicate much with it, you can discern some things from a dog’s hair. First, a scared or stressed dog is likely to shed more than normal. It’s as though the scared dog is blowing his coat, and it suddenly comes out in buckets! You may have seen this if your dog gets nervous during visits to your veterinarian. After the examination, you, the vet and the table are covered with your dog’s hair.

 

Dogs may also stick up their hair to communicate how they are, which is called “piloerection,” or more colloquially, “raising the hackles.” Although dogs’ hair is most often raised over the withers (the area where the tops of a dog’s shoulder blades meet), dogs can raise their hair all along their spine. Dogs raise their hair when they’re aroused about something. It’s comparable to a person having goose bumps. Raised hackles can mean that a dog is afraid, angry, insecure, unsure, nervous or wildly excited about something.