Let the fur fly!

If you have more than one dog and they are anything like my two, give them a furry toy and between them it will be ripped apart and de-stuffed within seconds.  Personally I've never cared about the fluffy mess that this creates, but the fun-to-money ratio is way out of balance and there came a point last summer when I was no longer willing to spend my hard-earned cash for just a few, frenzied moments of doggy joy.  So I came up with this - the furry-ragger - which has proved to a be a huge hit with my two.

To make a furry-ragger, you will need:

Article search and retrieve

The dog’s sense of smell is thought to be around 100,000 times better than our own with an estimated 40 times more brain area devoted to analysing odours.   Scientific studies reveal that dogs can detect chemical solutions at just one to two parts per trillion, and human finger prints that are up to two weeks old.  It’s no wonder that dogs are used to detect explosives, drugs, gas leaks, termites, people, cancer, diabetes, seizures, and even when cows are in oestrus (season/heat).

Article search and retrieve is a great way to put your dog’s extraordinary olfactory ability to good use.  This simple exercise requires the dog to search out hidden articles bearing your own scent and bring them to you. 

Snack-in-a-Box

Are you fed up with buying expensive 'indestructable' toys that your dog wastes no time in ripping to shreds?  Do you love the idea of 'activity' toys but don't buy them because your dog isn't the type to gently take her time working out how to get the treat out of the carefully designed, labyrinth of chambers?  Do you want a toy that combines your dog's passion for ripping stuff up with simple problem solving that costs just a few pence?  Was that a yes?

Then this is for you ~ the homemade Snack-in-a-Box!

Does your dog eat poop?

It does?  Then you are not alone.  It's a common behaviour.  Many dogs do it, and in certain contexts it's completely normal.  In some parts of the world, dogs are still used to clean baby's bottoms.  And for the populations of village dogs around the world, a smorgasbord of poop undoubtedly forms a substantial part of their daily diets. 

Poop eating - or 'coprophagia' to give it the correct term - is classed both as a normal behaviour and an abnormal behaviour in dogs depending on type and context.

Firstly, the types of coprophagia:

Commercially produced dog food ~ making sense of the label

Commercially produced dog food - kibbles, cans and pouches - is big business, and with such a wide and differing range of brands and varieties, all claiming to be the best food that you could possibly give to your dog, picking the right one (or even a good one) is confusing to say the least. Even a high price is no guarantee of nutritional quality - maybe of quality of ingredients, but whether those ingredients are biologically appropriate and digestible requires a bit of study.