SNIFFING STATIONS!

This will not be news to you, at all, that dogs love sniffing. Sniffing isn’t just a fun past-time for dogs, it’s essential behaviour that they MUST do for behavioural health.

Not only that, sniffing can be a great training tool.

Sniffing for training

Dogs pull on lead for lots of reasons:

they’re excited to be out and about
the world is an exciting place
they have twice the number of legs we do
they want to get sniffing and sniffing and sniffing
they want to get to things
they want to get away from things
we have trained them to pull

Pet owners spend lots of money on all sorts of, often times, scary equipment and lots of time on training exercises, to improve their dogs’ loose leash walking skills.

Changing the dog’s motivation for behaviour, and reducing his expectation (that crazy behaviour is required) will help to prevent pulling behaviour, making walks more enjoyable for all.

SNIFFING STATIONS

Is there a time or area in which your dog really, really pulls?

Do you find it difficult to get your dog from point A to point B, on lead?

Are there particular distractions that you find difficult to manage?

Establishing Sniffing Stations will help:

to get your dog out the door, without too much craziness
to get your dog from the house to the car, or from the car to the park or from one spot to a very exciting place
your dog get passed, toward or through particularly distracting situations
your dog get to another person or dog in a calmer fashion
to get a dog from a kennel to an exercise area
to get a dog to an exit (or entrance)
the dog to associate good things with potentially distracting or worrying triggers
your dog’s focus on you to increase

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Start with your dog on lead, and use really yummy food rewards.

say “Go Sniff!”
drop a couple of treats to the ground, across your dog’s eyeline if possible but just point them out if he misses them
let your dog eat the treats
repeat approx. every two metres

We start out with Sniffing Stations close to one another, and can move them further apart as the dog improves, or closer together for really tricky distractions.

If you know that you need to move the dog over the same short route, make more permanent Sniffing Stations.
Use double-sided tape to secure little bowls or even lids to each spot. Pre-load with treats for each trip.
For more temporary but pre-loaded Sniffing Stations, use little pieces of double-sided tape at each station and place treats on each one. This will also take the dog a little longer to eat, so is great to get dog past tricky distractions.
(Securely stick tape so that the dog doesn’t take that too!)

Teach sniffing on cue

Put sniffing on cue:

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Sniffing is a handy training exercise because:

your dog loves to sniff (and is already really good at it)!
sniffing is a polite dog behaviour and can be used to diffuse the tension between two dogs at a distance
sniffing is a calming behaviour for your dog
sniffing can help to divert your dog’s attention away from a trigger
sniffing can be used as a release cue, to let your dog know they they can go be a dog again
sniffing can be used to keep your dog busy or entertained when you are otherwise engaged
sniffing can be used to help your dog calm after excitement
sniffing can be used as a reward, after recalling for example
sniffing can be used to help your dog form more pleasant associations toward some trigger