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Use Your Dog's Nose For a Good Workout

Posted by Clare Bristow

I'm constantly amazed at the jobs dogs are given by virtue of their extraordinary powerful sense of smell.

In today's Pocono Record Dr Marty Becker lists a number of the unusual jobs dogs have - ranging from sniffing out bed bugs to determining which cows in a herd of cattle are in heat.

A couple unusual dogs with jobs I've read about that aren't on the list are:

• dogs being used to alert their diabetic owners that they are about to fall into a diabetic coma. Apparently the dog is trained to detect a fall in their owner's blood sugar level; and
• a dog trained to detect when his owner is about to faint due to a chronic fainting disorder that's linked to an irregular heartbeat.

My dogs love to follow a scent - nothing useful, just rabbits, possums and the neighbors cats - and they are in a world of their own as they charge back and forth through the bush on the trail of a scent, their stubby tails stuck straight up in the air.

One game I play with them is to throw a handful of their dried food into the long grass and send them off to find the biscuits. If I scatter the food over a wide enough area it can keep the two of them busy for up to 20 minutes.

The benefit of this for Fritz and Zoe is that it gives them a good mental workout - mental work is tiring for a dog - as well as a food reward, which always goes down well.

After giving the dogs a short run and 20 minutes nose work, I have 2 tired dogs that will contentedly sleep in front of the fire for the rest of the evening.

If you don't already, try introducing some nose work into your dog's daily exercise routine - he'll love the mental stimulation.

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