Episode #162 Enrichment Ideas for Dogs

Ever felt guilty for not giving your four-legged friend the outdoor adventure they crave on those blustery days? Fret no more! I, Amy Jensen, am here with a treasure trove of indoor enrichment activities that will keep your pooch mentally stimulated and their tail wagging with joy. Join us as we delve into the world of puzzle toys and food puzzles that challenge your dog's problem-solving skills and keep the dreaded boredom at bay. From the comfort of your living room, discover how you can strengthen the bond between you and your pup with games that tap into their natural olfactory talents.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is the Puppy Training Podcast, episode 162 Enrichment Ideas for Dogs. This podcast is designed to help you on your journey of becoming best friends through love and learning, as you train your own dog from home, and I'm here to help you every step of the way. This is the Puppy Training Podcast, and I'm your host, amy Jensen. Hello, welcome to the Puppy Training Podcast. I'm so glad you are here. I'm Amy Jensen. If we haven't met, I'm the owner and creator of Baxter and Bella, the online puppy school, and I know we call this the Puppy Training Podcast and we call our school the online puppy school, but we help dogs of all ages.

Speaker 1: 0:44

Now today in Utah, it is a blizzard. We are getting some snow that we need, so we're thankful for it, but it is very cold and very windy outside, and Baxter and I have not had our daily walk yet. So I thought why not on the podcast? Talk about a few fun enrichment activities that I do with Baxter and that you can do with your dog. On days when maybe you can't get outside as much as you would like, maybe due to weather, but also sometimes when we have new puppies we don't have a private outdoor space that they can play in. We spend a lot of time indoors, so if you have a new puppy who is unvaccinated and you are being careful about where they play, then this episode is also for you. Now, enriching the lives of our dogs is essential. It just makes for happier, healthier canine companions, so it benefits their well-being and their happiness.

Speaker 1: 1:33

Various methods can be used to stimulate our dog's minds and keep them engaged. There are so many options out there Puzzle toys, kong toys, west paws, topples are among our favorites. The Pup Pod is a great option. Outward Hound is a brand that we look to a lot for food puzzle toys they just all offer mental stimulation as dogs work to extract food or treats from these items and these toys. So these toys encourage problem solving skills and prevent boredom. We also love to play games.

Speaker 1: 2:08

I love games. You guys. If you are in my program and you come to my classes and courses, you know I try to make everything a game. So today I thought you know what. I'm just going to share with you a few of our favorites things that we like to do when it's cold outside.

Speaker 1: 2:22

Sent games are really fun for dogs, so let's start there. Dogs love to sniff. Sniffing is relaxing for a dog and it's very entertaining. It's very also self rewarding. They really like it. So this taps into their natural olfactory abilities and it provides them with mental and sensory stimulation. So things like hiding treats or toys for your dog to find, encouraging them to use their nose and engage in a rewarding scavenger hunt, things like that will all fall under the category of sent games.

Speaker 1: 2:54

Now notice how excited your dog gets when you get involved by pointing out the food rewards along the way. So you hide food rewards throughout your house and if you go hey, look over here, here's one. Hey, here's another one. Puppy, puppy, over here, here's another one they start to get really excited and they begin to watch you automatically, as they know hey, she's really good at this game and they want me to keep finding more food for them. It's beneficial to them. Right Now at Baxter and Bella, we teach you and your dog how to play what we call the find your food game and, similarly, find your toy game. Now, these are great fun and they both build a great bond between you and your dog. Are you interested in giving it a try? Here's how to play.

Speaker 1: 3:34

Take three small bowls. Plastic works great. We don't want them to be breakable. Place one food reward in each container. It doesn't have to be a large piece, just a small piece of something your dog loves. Place the three containers in one room right. Put them in spots easily accessible to your dog. We always set our dogs up for success. Help them win, and the more they win, the more they want to keep playing right. So make it easy in the beginning, and then we'll make it harder later on. But place these bowls out and around in one room, one area where your dog can easily see them. Either have someone hold your dog or, better yet, practice a sit stay. If they know those behaviors, that's a great way to incorporate some of the training you've been doing with this rewarding game. So, if your dog can do a simple sit stay, ask for a sit stay. Place the bowls around the room and then, when you are ready, release your dog to go find their food.

Speaker 1: 4:22

Iq, go find your food, and at first you may need to point to the bowl to get them started. Look over here, hey, come find this right. And when they find the first one, mark yes, good dog, and then cue, go find your food again, so they know there are more rewards to find. Now, once all the treats are found, you can repeat, but make it a bit harder for them. So space the containers further apart, start to maybe make one visible and two are hidden behind, say, a chair or a sofa, so they're in the same area, same room, but behind some furniture. And then next time you could make it even harder by maybe putting one bowl in a different room, right, or then eventually two bowls in different rooms and then they're all three in separate rooms and maybe not even in the room you start in. Maybe your dog's in a sit state and now you're hiding the bowls upstairs and then you release them to go find them.

Speaker 1: 5:13

You can take this to all sorts of different levels, but start small, start so simple that your puppy can be really successful at this, and then it just gets better and better. So when they find the first one, you're marking yes and queuing hey, go find your food again. And once all the treats are found, then you just keep repeating it. Now, each time you play, you just make it more challenging and get the entire family involved. It's also helpful at the end of the game to queue all done, and I just like to use a simple hand signal of taking both of my hands palm up and then turning them to the ground, just as a way of letting my dog know that we're all done, the game is finished. Otherwise they might just keep going around your house looking for more. Another option to really help your dog out with this is to simply just pick up all of the containers and make sure your dog sees you picking them up and putting them away.

Speaker 1: 6:01

We play another similar game with Baxter's Toys. So I taught him to find your food game first, and then I took his knowledge of that game and generalized it to his favorite toy. So once he learned that game, I just simply replaced the bowls with the toy he loves. Now I ask him for a sit-stay, I hide his toys somewhere in the house and then I pause for a dramatic effect. You'll see that it gets your dog more excited to play this game as well and then all of a sudden say, okay, go find your toy. And then he gets to go find it and he loves this game. He will scour the house looking for his favorite item and once he finds it he'll grab it and run it back to wherever I am to show me that he found it. It's super cute, super fun and it's a great way to exercise your dog again on a cold day when you maybe can't be running around outside as much as they usually do, and then you can actually get some things done too while your dog's out searching for their toy, and then they come back and want you to hide it again. So that's a great one. We love that one.

Speaker 1: 7:01

Now, a company that we like we're not an affiliate for them, but we do like their products. It's called Outward Hound and they have a lot of different food puzzles that I find to be fantastic options for mental enrichment. These interactive toys challenge dogs to figure out how to access hidden food, so it promotes cognitive skills. It prevents destructive behaviors just because it's eliminating that boredom that your dog might experience from spending the day inside. Now, when we are stuck inside on cold, snowy days, baxter's meal is going in an Outward Hound puzzle, so we have one in particular that's around disk and you open the top of it a clear plastic top and you can put the food down in it. It's almost like a little maze, and then you put the top back on and he's going to bob that disk up and down, just kind of paw at it and try to move it around, because there's three holes along the outside that the food spills out onto the floor from. So he finds it very engaging. These products, you guys, if you are interested, are on our Amazon products page. We are an affiliate for Amazon so you can find links to that puzzle on our products tab of our menu bar. Now I find that Baxter's much happier and able to settle himself better after thinking how am I going to get my meal for the day, how am I going to get this food out of this puzzle toy? You can just tell that some mental enrichment goes a long way in creating a less restless and more satisfied Baxter.

Speaker 1: 8:24

Another product that we really like, and we are an affiliate for, is the PUT pod. So this is a company that they've taken enrichment just a step further by integrating technology. This interactive game pairs with a smartphone app, so you just pull out your phone, turn on the game and it challenges dogs to touch a sensor and then in order for the food to be tossed from a machine. So there's two pieces there's the machine that has the food in it and then there's a little sensor pod and if the dog touches the pod, then it tells the machine to release the food and then the dogs get to go find the scattered food on the ground and then if they want to play again, they have to run over and touch that little pod, which makes it really nice, especially on a snowy day when it's cold, because you get to move that pod around so you could even put the pod. Eventually, once they learn how to play this game in a different room, they'll have to run out of the room, go find the pod, touch it and then run back to where the food is being dispensed, which is great for both physical and that mental exercise that we talk about. So love that one. That one's fun.

Speaker 1: 9:24

Now, don't forget just the simple-ness, you guys, of basic training. That is also great. Mental and physical exercise, right, practicing sit and down and stay and come, jump on, turn, like even tricks, spinning in circles, asking for high fives, asking for shakes, playing dead, whatever it is that you've taught your dog to do. Practice those things, especially on those cold days when you're inside and they're not getting as much exercise outside. Just remember that training sessions are great and you can make it playful as well. We have so many games and activities on our website in our members area that you can just go pick a game. It's actually a training game, so you're getting the training and the fun all at the same time.

Speaker 1: 10:10

Another thing I want to mention here is, you know, going back to the idea that, hey, we didn't get our walk today, it's a blizzard outside and we both don't want to go out. Let's face it, I like to do an inside version of a ghost niff walk, if you will. So, you know, put backs around a leash. We'll walk in and around our house, just in and out of every room, around furniture, sofas, tables, chairs, whatever we can find, practicing just nice, good, loose leash walking skills. Now you can add to this a little bit of fun by, you know, having your dog in a crate or in a sit stay or having someone hold them while you go throughout the house and just deposit a little food reward maybe one in every room and then, as you start your leash walking, you can it's almost like a treasure hunt a ghost niff walk, but inside. So, as you're walking through the room, allow your dog to go sniff and find the treats. You can even point out to them hey, look over here, what's over here? And again, going back to my first comment, your dog starts to really watch you. They are interested in where you're going next because you're going to help them find that next food reward. And they pick up that you are their best helper for this scavenger hunt. Again, dogs love to sniff. It's fun for them. So hiding things around your house and then going for that nice loose leash walk around your house can benefit. The leash walk for sure, the skills that your dog needs to practice, but also they find rewards along the way, which is super fun.

Speaker 1: 11:31

So to summarize, today you guys just pull out some enrichment things, go find some new ideas. It is a multifaceted approach that includes puzzle toys, scent games, interactive puzzles like outward hound, technologically advanced options like the pup pod. Remember those basic training sessions and all the good that it does just to practice the simple things and cues that you've taught your dog already. And then making those ghost niff walks happen inside. Why not right? There are tons of ideas for dog enrichment circling around social media groups these days. Do you have something that you do with your dog for enrichment? I would love to know about it. So share it with us. Please just tag us at Baxter and Bella. That's all one word, lowercase letters Baxter A and D Bella on Instagram. We would love to see what you and your dog like to do when you are stuck inside. Thanks for sharing your ideas. If you have a question about anything you heard on this podcast or any other puppy training question, visit my site, baxter and Bellacom, to contact me.