Happier Together: Boosting Joy Through a Natural Understanding of Dog Instincts
Tired of feeling like you can’t help your dog calm down? Feel like you can’t figure out how to make life together a little easier?
We all love our dogs and want the best for them, AND our lives are busy and we don’t always know how to meet their needs beyond our daily walks. This blog is focused on quick things that take 5 minutes or less for you while providing activities that will get your dog wagging for ten to forty-five minutes or more!
All dogs are different, and we don’t always understand what they need based on their individual uniqueness, and some tendencies that we humans have intentionally bred into them. This blog is designed to help you explore super easy ways to meet some of their needs quickly and efficiently, all in one place.
Is your dog a digger, chaser, chewer, dissector, or frantic sniffer? Is your dog always getting into things?
Creative Ways to Encourage Natural Dog Behaviors That Work for You
As a certified professional dog trainer and instructor of positive reinforcement classes for puppies and adult dogs, I often hear questions like, "Why does my dog…"
Chew on the remote
Dig up my favorite parts of the garden
Shred pillows, the couch, or toilet paper rolls
Sniff constantly and pull on walks (please let them sniff)
Bark in the yard and jump on guests
Steal laundry or garbage from the trash, and so on…
These behaviors are showing up for a reason! They are clues as to some of your pup's needs as a canine. They do it because it feels good to them or because it is an unmet need of sorts; they are showing us behaviors that were needed for the survival of their species and are part of their evolutionary hard wiring
If they have no way to meet the need, they will find one. Engaging our pups with opportunities to meet these needs in productive ways has enormous benefits for their mental health; we just do not want them to decide that shredding the couch is the way to meet the need!
If they don’t have a job; they will self-employ, and you probably won’t like the job they pick!
Join me in exploring ways to help our best friends get some of those needs met. Thanks for sniffing around!
Easy Win Number 1: Cookie Scatters
Why dogs need to forage and why ditching your food bowl is a huge gift to your pup:
In their evolutionary past, dogs relied on their sense of smell to hunt and track prey and to forage for food. Sniffing in dogs is hard-wired to help them survive as a species.
Dogs have a highly developed sense of smell, up to 300 million scent receptors compared to our 5 million. Sniffing allows them to gather information about their environment and is essential for finding food and detecting potential dangers.
Sniffing is mentally stimulating and can help reduce stress and anxiety in dogs.
Overall, sniffing is a vital part of a dog's life, contributing to their overall well-being and natural behaviors and it lowers the heart rate.
Instructions (always scan your space for any hazards first):
Take all or some of their meal portion that you typically feed from a bowl (toss in a unique treat or two if you like).
Walk out to your backyard or a grassy field – free from foxtails, random dogs or other dangers.
Say “Party” or “Cookies” and throw those treats all over your yard or grassy space. Rather than them gobbling up breakfast in 30 seconds, let them use their noses to search for the food for 20 minutes or more. They will finish having fulfilled their purpose of foraging, elevated their mood, and feel more calm.
Estimated Human Time: 30 seconds to 1 minute
Estimated Dog Time: Highly variable depending on space, volume of food, foraging efficiency (20 min, plus)
Caution: If you have multiple dogs and any guard food or toys, separate your dogs.
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