March 22, 2023
Springtime Sniffy Walks of Wonder!
Spring is officially here, and you know what that means…SNIFFY WALKS OF WONDER!
We all know that dogs love to sniff and that using scent is an incredibly important component to a dog’s overall happiness and well-being. Well, what better time of year to take advantage of nature than the change of season!
Have you noticed that your dog “perks up” on walks whenever the season is changing? The warm baking earth under summer’s hot sun seems to comfort and delight dogs. Afterward, decaying fall leaves are of interest one moment, then the scent of smoke from fireplaces and imminent snow in the air. And now the fresh, fragile, tiny growths popping up out of the ground are of great interest to our “canine kids”. There’s nothing quite like watching your dog enjoy and explore their surroundings.
I like to encourage people to allow their dogs plenty of time to sniff and take in their surroundings. Dragging a dog along on a walk and not allowing time to explore with their nose is punishing and removes a very important piece of a dog’s daily enrichment needs puzzle. Think about it like this: would a nature walk be enjoyable for you if you were forced to walk in a straight line staring straight ahead? If you were unallowed to watch the sights and visually observe your environment? You’d probably wonder what the point was. This is true for dogs with scent. Dogs have up to 300 million olfactory receptors in their noses, where we humans have about 6 million. The area in a dog’s brain that processes scent is around 40 times greater than ours. It is not far from accurate to say that dogs “see” scents! A 2022 Cornell study shows that a dog’s sense of smell is integrated with visual processing in the brain! So while humans are very visually oriented, dogs get a HUGE amount of information and stimulation from scent.
Aside from the fun and the mental stimulation of sniffing, dogs also benefit emotionally from the activity. Sniffing has been shown to lower a dog’s heart rate and elicit calm. One study actually shows that allowing dogs to sniff around their environment helps to create a sense of optimism. This means that when a dog is likely to find something interesting when investigating with his nose, he is then more likely to feel confident that there are additional worthwhile things to interact with in his environment. This is incredibly important when it comes to building confidence in a dog or helping a reactive dog feel more calm and secure when out and about.
Please, Let Them Sniff! Bring a daily dose of wonder into your walking routine with your dogs. Allow them to express the very important and natural need to interact with scent in the world – and allow yourself to be amazed by their nearly supernatural use of this sense. Take the time to slow down and enjoy your walks as much as your dog does. Simply watching your dog be happy can make a huge difference in your enjoyment of your daily exercise. If we take cues from our pups and slow down and soak in the world around us, we’ll be on the way to learning to recharge, connect, and enjoy – even if our busy schedules only allow for a few stolen moments a day. Now, sniff, observe, and enjoy!