For such a seemingly simple appendage, a dog’s tail does a lot of complex things. It helps a dog maintain balance and enables swift, agile movement. It’s also one of the most important indicators of how a dog is feeling at any given time, and can convey a surprising amount of useful information, if we know the “tells.”<\/p>
The wagging tail is most often associated with happiness—and it does sometimes signal that a dog is happy to see us, or the other person, dog, or object in their path. But not all wags mean happiness. Anyone who lives with a dog, or simply interacts with dogs with any frequency will do themselves—and those dogs—a big service by learning what tail wags are really saying.<\/p>
Here’s a video guide to what some of the different wags mean.<\/p>