Welcome to Day 61 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
Now it’s your turn to get creative! Every Friday is Freestyle Friday. We’ll give you the ingredients for a puzzle or enrichment device and you build it.
Rules:
you must use all the ingredients
you can add anything else you like, or nothing at all
You can add food or toys or anything else appropriate, if you like. Or you can use this as it is.
We can’t wait to see what fun and brain games you and your pet get up to with this one!
Your challenge
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 60 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
last time, Day 52, we did your favourite ‘trick’ behaviour, today you will be working on MY favourite!
“middle” is often referred to as ‘peek-a-boo’ and involves the dog moving around one of your legs so that they stand or sit between your legs, facing the same direction as you
trick-training is often approached differently and thought of differently
there’s no such thing as “just a trick – it’s ALL tricks to the dog
this simple ‘trick’ can be applied to lots of real life situations, as well as being a cute ‘peek-a-boo’ part piece
get the family involved in this one – children can be great dog trainers with lots of guidance, and lots of these behaviours are child-friendly, and make maintaining the peace with kids and K9s easier.
Remember, supervise children in all enrichment activities and interactions with pets.
training exercises can be practiced in individual sessions of no more than 30 seconds at a time; have as many sessions as you can!
What do you need?
food rewards – you can use your dog’s regular food, a training mix, commercial treats, home prepared treats such as cut up meats, cheese, vegetables or homemade treats such as liver or tuna cake
toys or access to anything that your dog will work for
I am not a massive ‘trick training’ fan. But, I do love the enthusiasm and lightness that people bring to teaching trick behaviours – it’s seen as frivolous and fun…all teaching should be approached in the same way because it’s all tricks to the dogs.
Enrichment Goals:
Teaching simple behaviours, without the pressure of OBEDIENCE, brings benefits to both ends of the lead.
the dog learns how to learn – this is just another puzzle to your dog…”how do I train the human to make rewards available?!“…it’s all human training, for dogs!
to teach the dog that their human will ask for behaviour and will make sure reinforcement is available – this reduces stress by improving predictability and controlability
For the human:
lots of more practical applications – real life situations
While training exercises certainly fall into the cognitive enrichment category, they can provide so much more.
Providing dogs with cues allows for a complex level of communication between two species; you are merely requesting that the dog perform behaviour (he already knows how to do the behaviour…they can already drop things) and that request comes with a contract. Respond appropriately to this signal and rewards are coming your way. That’s the deal…that’s what being a good teacher is about – keeping your word and making it easy for your dog to train you.
This forges the most healthy of relationships between our two species. This is a level of social enrichment that’s tricky to replicate.
When we talk about enrichment being enriching, this is never more clear than when we start to teach behaviours intentionally. It’s the human’s job to set the dog up for success by making sure the behaviour is doable and that rewards are fast-flowing.
There’s no test at the end of this and you and your pet are not under any pressure. Learn to enjoy the time together, whether you achieve the goal behaviour or not. That’s what’s enriching here…the social and cognitive outlets such exercises provide (for both species).
What goals can you add to this list for your pets?
How can we achieve these goals?
although you can use any reward that your dog will work for, using small food rewards that are quick to eat are best for these exercises so we can have lots of fast repetitions
keep it simple and split behaviour – reward approximations toward the final behaviour, rather than hoping that your dog will offer the goal behaviour quickly
take your time and work in many short sessions
try for 30 seconds at a time, 5-10 rewards each session, and then take a break
portion out your dog’s daily food and allot some for training exercises
make a training mix by adding in something yummier and leaving it all to ‘cook’ together in the fridge; the smells will mingle, harder foods will soften a little, and everything will become more valuable
remember to adjust your pet’s diet accordingly to accommodate the extra calories from treats added, where relevant
split your food rewards into little bowls with just the right number of rewards in each bowl so that you are ready to go; stick bowls of rewards in places where you may need to teach and reward behaviours so that you have rewards ready to go
If you are feeding wet or fresh foods, cut up small or mash to a paste and present on a wooden spoon or spatula. Alternatively you can freeze in small ice cube trays or a pyramid baking tray so that you can use small portions and individual treats.
What adjustments will you make for your pets?
Applications of the “middle” trick
I prefer to approach tricks from the applicable point of view.
How can these behaviours offer real-life benefits?
What behaviours can I teach, with a tricks-attitude, that really benefit the dog’s experience?
I want to concentrate on teaching behaviours that benefit the animal, that they might choose as behavioural solutions in their day to day life. “Middle” can be a simple solution for lots of applications.
Enrichment Options
Middle can be applied as a cute trick, to position or line-up the dog, as part of play, games and enthusiasm-building, to restrain or confine the dog, to divert the dog and in husbandry situations.
Option 1 Teach “middle”
To teach this simple behaviour we will use a technique called luring. This means to guide the dog into position with a food reward held at his nose. The dog is rewarded with the lure when he gets in position.
Start with a food reward in each hand. The reward in your right hand is the lure and the one in your left hand is the lure.
stand with your legs slightly wider than shoulder width apart
hold the lure under your thumb and show it to your dog
move your right hand out and around your right leg
if needed, reward the dog, by dropping the lure, just behind your knees, to start with
when they eat that treat, drop the treat from your left hand just in front of you so that the dog moves through your legs
after a few trials, stop dropping the reward behind you and instead only reward with the treat in front
Soon you will be able to get rid of that lure in your right hand. Just move your empty lure hand as you did and your dog will follow it.
Continue to reward with the treat in your left hand.
The first minute of this clip demonstrates the step-by-step to teach this behaviour:
Once your dog is moving into middle position, without a lure being needed, we can begin to adapt this trick behaviour to lots of different applications.
To build duration in middle position, feed the dog in position, rather than tossing the treat to the floor with left hand.
Feed up high and your dog might find it easier to sit; you could ask them to sit too. Feed five treats in position and then toss one out so that you an repeat.
You will notice that your dog is immediately focusing on you when they move into middle position.
Practice in lots of different places.
Option 3 Line up!
Ask your dog to move into middle position, feed them in position and/or ask them to sit.
If the dog can hold position ask them to wait or stay (or whatever cue or exercise you use).
In this clip, I use a middle position to line Decker up for the next rep:
Sending the dog to middle position and then out again, after a tossed treat, is a great way to activate and build enthusiasm for returning to you. On Day 43, we worked on fast and fun recalls and this exercise is a great addition to your practice.
Every day, I use middle position to keep Decker with me, to restrain him in one place safely, or to turn or divert him away from something such as traffic or passersby.
We can teach the dog to turn in middle position by tossing the treat in the direction you intend to move.
Middle position offers lots of applications for husbandry procedures. My favourite applications here are to use the middle position as a way for small or young dogs to consent to being picked up and to position the dog, along with a chin target, for a jugular blood draw.
The priority when training any husbandry exercise is to make sure that you develop true CERs (Conditioned Emotional Responses) to the goings on so that the dog becomes comfortable and enjoys the procedure, rather than attempting to avoid or merely tolerating.
We have talked lots about consent, choice and conditioning so that pets develop a strong positive emotional response to potentially invasive situations. (Day 3, Day 17 & Day 24)
Layer each stage of difficulty carefully and gradually so as to build that positive attitude at every step.
Build joy in the middle position behaviour first and once you have that, then you can gradually add picking up, a little at a time, across many sessions:
Teach a middle position and a chin target (Day 15) behaviours separately. Once there is joy in each, practice chin targets in middle position.
Handling and manipulation can be added VERY gradually to that for a blood draw.
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 59 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
engagement games teach the dog to choose you, even when you don’t have treats or toys, and even when there are distractions
we start with simple training games and build toward more and more engagement
cognitive based enrichment
while children might be able to participate with some of these exercises, there will be lots of canine excitement and activity with some of these games so they might not be safe for kids
Remember, supervise children in all enrichment activities and interactions with pets.
training exercises can be practiced in individual sessions of 1-2 minutes at a time; have as many sessions as you can!
Because today challenges will be pretty exciting, make some time, after each session, for some lapping and chewing on stuffables.
Think Rollercoaster Games!
‘To engage’ is defined as participating, to attract someone’s attention, and the one I particularly like, to establish meaningful contact or connection.
The important things to note here is that the dog chooses to engage, that they are working to attract your attention, and that you’re (both) developing a meaningful connection.
Engagement, for me and the dogs I work with, including my own, is about the dog choosing to engage, wanting to engage, finding me the most rewarding, over all the other things.
And that’s the key; the dog wants to be involved and to participate.
What do you need?
food rewards – you can use your dog’s regular food, a training mix, commercial treats, home prepared treats such as cut up meats, cheese, vegetables or homemade treats such as liver or tuna cake
if you are working in an unsecured area, use a long line for safety and to prevent your dog practicing not recalling and having lots of fun, in the environment, with out you
Enrichment Goals:
to teach the dog to choose you (and to teach the human to be fun, exciting and rewarding enough to choose)
to teach the dog that choosing their human makes the magic happen
to teach the dog that their human won’t nag or coerce
to build that bond between dog and human
to have a fun and rewarding experience in social situations, between dogs and humans
to learn about learning – this is just another puzzle to your dog…”how do I train the human to make rewards available?!“…it’s all human training, for dogs!
While training exercises certainly fall into the cognitive enrichment category, they can provide so much more.
Working on choice-led engagement exercises helps to boost your relationship with your pet, enhances your ability to communicate with one another and builds trust. This is a level of social enrichment that’s tricky to replicate.
When we talk about enrichment being enriching, this is never more clear than when we start to teach behaviours intentionally. It’s the human’s job to set the dog up for success by making sure the behaviour is doable and that rewards are fast-flowing.
There’s no test at the end of this and you and your pet are not under any pressure. Learn to enjoy the time together, whether you achieve the goal behaviour or not. That’s what’s enriching here…the social and cognitive outlets such exercises provide (for both species).
What goals can you add to this list for your pets?
How can we achieve these goals?
although you can use any reward that your dog will work for, using small food rewards that are quick to eat are best for some of these exercises so we can have lots of fast repetitions
toys and your engagement, fun and play will work as excellent rewards for some other exercises
keep it simple and split behaviour – reward approximations toward the final behaviour, rather than hoping that your dog will offer the goal behaviour quickly
take your time and work in many short sessions
try for a couple of minutes at a time, 5-10 rewards each session, and then take a break
plan each session – what behaviours are you looking for and rewarding?
watch the clips and try out the exercise
portion out your dog’s daily food and allot some for training exercises
make a training mix by adding in something yummier and leaving it all to ‘cook’ together in the fridge; the smells will mingle, harder foods will soften a little, and everything will become more valuable
remember to adjust your pet’s diet accordingly to accommodate the extra calories from treats added, where relevant
split your food rewards into little bowls with just the right number of rewards in each bowl so that you are ready to go; stick bowls of rewards in places where you may need to teach and reward behaviours so that you have rewards ready to go
What adjustments will you make for your pets?
Applications of engagement games:
You can easily see the value of engagement…it gets you great recall, it gets you nice loose leash walking, it gets you working around distractions.
All while providing the dog with choice. The choice to engage.
When engagement happens, the dog is fighting to engage regardless of the presence of distractions and triggers and regardless of whether you have treats or toys.
How ever you define it, engagement is chosen by the dog, rather than cued; engagement is not contingent on you having food rewards or toys.
The key to engagement is that you are not trying to get it, you are worthy of engagement and your dog fights to engage!
You can see that engagement is the foundation to teaching all the other behaviours; it’s what we build our relationship, with our dog, on and with.
Engagement is a two-way street
Making engagement happen starts with the human. If we want our dog to choose us, regardless of what else is going on and regardless of whether you have treats or toys, we have to work to prove that engaging with us is the best!
When the dog is engaged, choosing you regardless, he pushes into the learning and interacting process; he is more than meeting you halfway.
Here’s a clip of Decker and I, in a play-group situation with dogs of mixed age, sex, and neuter status. Decker is an entire male Am Staff (a type of “pit bull”). I have no treats, food or toys – he fights to engage regardless of the distraction level.
Link (Disclaimer: this was not intended to stress out any dog, but more so to demonstrate the ability to develop such owner-focus and engagement without the use of aversives.)
Spot the fighting to engage?!
Reinforce engagement
Reinforcement strengthens behaviour, so your dog’s disengagement is information telling you that you are not making sufficient reinforcement available for engagement. (Or that there is too much value in competing reinforcers.)
We tend to pile on the encouragement, excitement, food and toys trying to get our dogs to engage. When their attention wanes, we attempt to get it back by offering access to reinforcers. Ask yourself, what behaviour are you really reinforcing?
Engagement makes good things happens. Engagement means that the dog accesses behaviour they like to do. Reinforce behaviour with behaviour.
What does your dog like to do? Make that happen contingent on engagement.
Enrichment Options
We’ve introduced engagement games already in relation to sniffing, on Day 34. Sniffing isn’t a problem behaviour but distractions, like irresistible smells, are often viewed as the enemy to training and attention. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Sniffing doesn’t need to be a distraction; we won’t make it a distraction because we won’t be stopping the dog from doing it.
We can allow dogs sniff, make sure they get their jollies while not having to nag them…and still have them choose us!
What is this black magic?, I hear you ask. It’s engagement!
Baseline: Can you engage your dog?
Can you engage your dog without treats, toys, cues?
Can you maintain engagement while you move?
For how long?
What do you need to do? Remember, you come to life once the dog has engaged, not before!
What will help engage a dog will depend on that dog and the environment you are working in. Let’s see where we are with choice-led engagement.
Here’s one minute of working for engagement with Decker:
Is engagement the same as attention and focus?
Well, yes and no. Great engagement will get you attention and focus, that’s for sure.
Attention probably means eye contact or something close to that. While focus may not necessarily require that the dog focus on you, perhaps on something specific in the environment.
We will start with some formal focus exercises; this one is our favourites!
Level 1 Find my Face!
start by dropping a food reward right at your toe
watch your dog closely as he eats it
as soon as you see him moving to raise his head, drop another food reward at your toe
Here we are working on loose leash walking and some traffic reactivity so we work in areas where the dog has slightly more visual access and proximity to passing traffic, increasing the challenge gradually and in small increments.
If the dog can’t choose their human, the distractions are too much. Move away, give your dog a break and next time, work further away.
Bring your dog out for a Sniffathon. Let your dog sniff and roam and do doggie things.
Wait for them to engage. Just wait.
As soon as your dog engages, come to life. Reward them with five food rewards in a row, one after another. Have some fun with food.
Tell your dog to Go Sniff! and release them to be a dog again. Show them your empty hands and move away. Allow your dog to sniff and explore again. Repeat.
Time how long it takes for them to engage – over time, we should be seeing a reduction in that time, with lots of practice.
Engagement Walks
Practice building engagement as part of your normal outings and walks with your dog. Learn to ask your dog if they are ready to engage, rather than nagging and harassing them by calling and luring and telling them. Ask, “are you ready?”.
If you are working in a non-secure public area, please make sure your dog is safe. Use a long line and follow them, allowing them to explore without pressure.
Create an Engagement Monster
Practicing this in all sorts of environments and amidst all sorts of distractions will help to establish this as a way of life for you and your dog.
To make sure this is fun and pleasant for all, take care with distractions and triggers. Work at such a distance that your dog is able to engage with you; if they are super focused on other dogs, people or goings on, then increase distance. Work in more controllable situations.
Playing Fun with Food games helps to boost the value of rewards and makes sure that there is a fun behaviour reinforcing engagement, not just eating.
Here’s my engagement monster and I play/train right beside wild deer (in the Phoenix Park). I make flirt pole and fun happen near distractions so engaging with me is a really easy choice!
And here we are surprised by a deer, who came running out of cover, apparently curious about our activity (a lot of people feed these deer here).
Rather than chasing a deer tens of metres away, he chooses to engage.
The deer follows us for a bit so I have his lead on, just hanging, just in case. Safety first, always.
But, regardless, he chooses engagement.
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 58 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
get the family involved in this one – kids love making puzzles for pets and these challenges offer lots of opportunities for children to use their imagination to come up with the best puzzles for their pets.
Remember, supervise children in all enrichment activities and interactions with pets.
Today’s puzzle prep will probably take you about five minutes – having a collection of puzzling stuff is a good idea…it will resemble a pile of rubbish or recycling!
What do you need?
paper of different types, for example, wrapping paper, kitchen paper, packing paper
Busy box stuff and assorted puzzle stuff such as cup holds, boxes, eggboxes, tubs, bottles, paper cup
Enrichment Goals:
to encourage a wide range of foraging and exploratory behaviours
to do more feeding related behaviour than just eating
to encourage the development of strategies (behaviours) for getting the food
by varying the design of each puzzle we will facilitate carrying out a range of different behaviours, broadening the dog’s repertoire
While this challenge is certainly food based, they are also experiencing cognitive, sensory and environmental enrichment, with lots of crossover between categories.
Working out how to get to the food and developing dexterous skills in manipulating the puzzles are examples of cognitive challenge.
Sniffing out, tasting and chewing food all offer sensory pay off, but so does finding their way through each food puzzle, determining its value, and engaging in the puzzle of getting to the good stuff.
Paper puzzles encourage pets to interact with their environment – just the very interaction with the puzzle is encouraging the pet to manipulate their surroundings to get the things they like.
By offering a variety of puzzles, we want to help the dog expand their range of puzzle-busting behaviours and facilitate your pet applying strategies from other puzzles to new ones; that’s a true cognitive gift and is growing your dog’s brain!
What goals can you add to this list for your pets?
How can we achieve these goals?
give your pet plenty of space for working on paper puzzle and bear in mind there will be mess, so think about spaces that are easier for clean up
the more difficult you have made the challenge, the higher the value the reward must be so use HIGH value foods to motivate exploration and experimentation and make it VERY easy to get the food (no frustration!)
if your dog just dives in, in full on destruction mode that might also be an indicator that they need an easier challenge so they get to experiment with a broader range of behaviours
What adjustments will you make for your pets?
Applications of Paper Puzzles:
When we make puzzles from essentially recyclable material, it allows us lots of puzzling versatility that can be adapted to suit the individual dog and our specific enrichment goals. You are only limited by your imagination!
Paper can make an excellent dissection outlet too, with some dogs, like Decker, just destroying it for the love it, without the need to add food.
No food needed…just dissection, for the love of it! (Link)
What I tend to see, though, when homemade puzzles are given to dogs, is that well-meaning owners go waaaaay over board, coming up with the most elaborate designs to really challenge their pet.
While it’s great to go for challenge, it’s important that enrichment remain enriching. That means that the challenge must be made appropriate and doable for the individual puzzler.
Our job is to adjust the puzzle difficulty so that our dog uses a range of behaviour and gets to the goal pretty quickly.
This is the true way to improve the dog’s confidence in puzzling (and in life) and help them expand their behavioural repertoire.
Because of the home made nature and variable materials used in these puzzles, it’s best to supervise your pet carefully when they have access to this puzzle.
Know your dog! If you have an ingester, paper puzzles may not work for you and your pet right now.
If you are concerned about your dog ingesting non-food items during puzzling, have a pocketful of HIGH value treats in your pocket and be ready to toss a couple toward your dog, across their eyeline, if you think they are thinking about eating the paper.
Making sure the challenge is very doable and they can get to the hidden food rewards quickly is key to modifying their behaviour and expectations during puzzling.
Check all your equipment for this challenge carefully and make sure to remove tape, staples, other fastners, small pieces and plastic pieces. Play safe!
Enrichment Options
Option 1: Snuffle it
Paper makes an excellent snuffing material, just added to a box or stuffed in a Busy box.
Foraging Box
Foraging Boxes can be a great way to recycle packing material!Link
Combine paper puzzles with other paper puzzles too to make compound puzzles and really challenge your dog!
Your challenge
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 57 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
games, interactions and activities that bring your dog up, then down, then up, then down….
applied to games you play with your dog, activities, outings and your dog’s entire day
cognitive based enrichment
while children can be great dog trainers, be safe with today’s challenges – we will be getting dogs pretty excited and that can sometimes be an inappropriate and unsuitable situation for children to be in
Remember, supervise children in all enrichment activities and interactions with pets.
sessions will vary in duration, but for the most part, play sessions should be brief; a few minutes at a time
What do you need?
favourite toys such as tug toys, ropes, tennis balls
food rewards – you can use your dog’s regular food, a training mix, commercial treats, home prepared treats such as cut up meats, cheese, vegetables or homemade treats such as liver or tuna cake
We will talk about human-dog play throughout this program, and one of the first lessons in learning to play with toys, with humans attached, is to teach the dog to release the toy so that the game can continue!
We want to be able to use a word to ask for an item to be released, whether that’s a toy or a ‘stolen’ item.
We introduced release cue exercises on Day 2. Having a release cue that’s relatively reliable will help with many of today’s challenges.
to help dogs develop skills improving their ability to calm themselves after excitement and cope with stress
to improve the dog’s ability to deal with excitement and exciting situations
to encourage more appropriate toy play between dog and human
to build that bond between dog and human
to have a fun and rewarding experience in social situations, between dogs and humans
Today’s challenges will involve some training aspects, but you don’t have to engage in formal ‘training’ if you would prefer – Rollercoaster Games can be played as part of daily life too.
While training exercises certainly fall into the cognitive enrichment category, they can provide so much more.
Providing dogs with cues allows for a complex level of communication between two species; you are merely requesting that the dog perform behaviour and that request comes with a contract. Respond appropriately to this signal and rewards are coming your way. That’s the deal…that’s what being a good teacher is about – keeping your word and making it easy for your dog to train you.
This forges the most healthy of relationships between our two species. This is a level of social enrichment that’s tricky to replicate.
When we talk about enrichment being enriching, this is never more clear than when we start to teach behaviours intentionally. It’s the human’s job to set the dog up for success by making sure the behaviour is doable and that rewards are fast-flowing.
There’s no test at the end of this and you and your pet are not under any pressure. Learn to enjoy the time together, whether you achieve the goal behaviour or not. That’s what’s enriching here…the social and cognitive outlets such exercises provide (for both species).
What goals can you add to this list for your pets?
How can we achieve these goals?
work with toys or other rewards that your dog enjoys
keep it simple and split behaviour – reward approximations toward the final behaviour, rather than hoping that your dog will offer the goal behaviour quickly
take your time and work in many short sessions
try for 30 seconds at a time, 5-10 rewards each session, and then take a break
plan each session – what behaviours are you looking for and rewarding?
watch the clips and try out the exercise
portion out your dog’s daily food and allot some for training exercises
make a training mix by adding in something yummier and leaving it all to ‘cook’ together in the fridge; the smells will mingle, harder foods will soften a little, and everything will become more valuable
remember to adjust your pet’s diet accordingly to accommodate the extra calories from treats added, where relevant
split your food rewards into little bowls with just the right number of rewards in each bowl so that you are ready to go; stick bowls of rewards in places where you may need to teach and reward behaviours so that you have rewards ready to go
If you are feeding wet or fresh foods, cut up small or mash to a paste and present on a wooden spoon or spatula. Alternatively you can freeze in small ice cube trays or a pyramid baking tray so that you can use small portions and individual treats.
What adjustments will you make for your pets?
Applications of Rollercoaster Games:
Life can be pretty exciting for dogs, and play even more so. When our dog gets excited, regardless of the source, the dog’s stress systems are engaged.
Stress isn’t all bad and really just refers to a challenge the body must deal with. Excitement is one way the body can do that – hones a dog’s focus, increases their heart and respiratory rate, gets them activated and moving around. None of this is bad.
But being in this state for extended periods is no fun. That can become distressing, the bad type of stress, and even lead to effects relating to chronic stress.
The excited dog’s body is preparing to cope with physical and behavioural challenge and when we expose them to exerting and exciting events simultaneously or one after another, they don’t have time to recover from being all wound up.
The stress systems that activate the body, causing excitement, is balanced by an opposing system that brings everything back down and between the two animals can wind up and calm down, over and over again.
When we engage our dogs in activity, especially exerting, arousing, repetitive, intense activity, like repetitive fetch games or group dog-dog play, we may be contributing to problems in a couple of ways.
Our dog is associating this feeling and need for excitement with specific situations, individuals or goings on leading to this stress response being elicited earlier and earlier, across more situations, and becoming more established.
This heightened state of stress causes physiological conditions that are essentially addictive; in humans we call these people “adrenaline junkies”. Canine adrenaline junkies, just like their human counterparts, may put themselves in situations where they can get their fix. And they need a bigger, harder hit every time.
This means these dogs are up and up and up and up, and may find it more difficult to come back down, to inhibit their behaviour, to respond to instruction or social etiquette, and may be living in a constant stress bubble.
The more the dog engages in such activities the more their baseline, for calm, is raised and they find it difficult to settle or calm themselves, they might be on edge, they might lose it quickly and easily, they might be over-active.
Rollercoaster Games are not about stopping activity or even preventing excitement, because where’s the fun in that (?), but instead, they are about helping prime our dogs’ stress systems to engage and relax, engage and relax. This helps our dog develop skills that allows them calm themselves more efficiently after getting wound up.
Enrichment Options
We can help our dogs live a Rollercoaster Life, facilitating calm after crazy. With lots of practice, especially for puppies and adolescents, this will become a way of life and your dog will learn to seek out calming activities to help him bring himself down.
Rollercoaster Days
Think of your dog’s entire day as a rollercoaster.
List all the things that bring your dog up.
This might include greeting him in the morning, preparing his breakfast, going outside to toilet and potter, you leaving him, you returning, the postman or passers-by, a neighbour dog barking, a cat visiting, the doorbell, seeing his lead, getting out for a walk, seeing other dogs, smelling the smells, playing fetch, fetch, fetch, fetch, fetch…
How much time does the dog get to recover from each upward swing?
What behavioural outlets are available to help him come down?
Making calm happen:
nobody calms down when they are told to be calm….(the normal response to instruction, from others, to calm down, is to respond “I AM CALM!”)
have locations and contexts that are associated with chilling out
engage the dog in calming activities such as sniffing, chewing, lapping
How can you inject some calm after arousing events?
chewing and lapping help dogs settle and bring themselves down at a number of different levels
Make a lined or stuffed Stuffable available after an exciting or exerting interaction or situation.
Have a range of chewables availalbe for your dog so that they can seek that out when they feel the need.
be calm
The temptation, when our dogs are crazy, is to crank up the activity and attempt to run it out of them. While physical exhaustion may sound like the key to happiness and a quiet life, really that’s probably going to contribute to further craziness.
Slowing your movements, lowering your voice, speaking quietly will help your dog calm too.
let them get the crazy out
Don’t try to stifle the craziness. Offer your dog calmer choices, but do let them choose. Sometimes they need to work through the crazy cycle to be able to choose a calmer option.
don’t try to force it
Remember, nobody calms down just because they are told to! Calming needs to come from the inside so the dog must get there, with our help rather than coercion. By providing outlets for calming, making them clearly available and making it easy for your dog to choose them.
identify crazy situations and do your best to reduce your dog’s exposure – make calm an easier choice.
practice calm when it’s easier to be calm – don’t wait for crazy situations to attempt to practice calm
Rollercoaster Outings
Getting out into the world is exciting for more dogs. To cope with the challenges associated with physical exertion, sensory stimulation, social interaction, staying safe and navigating the world, the body engages those stress systems, causing an increase in arousal.
None of that is necessarily bad but arousal piled on top of arousal on top of arousal might contribute to problems.
Think of your dog’s outing like a rollercoaster. Lots of that stuff is going to bring them up…but how will they come down…
think about when and where you go – are there certain triggers for crazy behaviour that might be more salient in certain places or at certain times
go off road – bring your dog places that allow them to sniff and roam, and provide lots of space so that you can escape crazy triggers if required
let them get the crazy out – make sure they have plenty of time at the start of their outing to get some energy out so don’t have high expectations and expect too much obedience
ask your dog if they are ready to respond – let them choose to engage
ask for simple behaviours and if your dog can eat food rewards and respond, have brief, one minute sessions now and then
facilitate lots and lots of sniffing – let ’em sniff as long as they need to and let them choose sniffing
By practicing this over several sessions you will teach your dog that the phrase “thank you!” means to check the floor for yummies. By conditioning this cue reliably, your dog will begin to drop things to search the floor for a treat.
Advanced:
With some practice, you can begin to apply your conditioned release cue to play. Just about our favourite toy game to play is tug and contrary to popular belief playing this game won’t lead to behaviour problems.
We love tug because:
the human and the dog has the toy most of the time
the fun is happening with the human
we can easily control and vary the intensity and duration of the game to better manage arousal
it’s an excellent confidence booster; check out shy-girl Cara’s confidence increase in this tug game here
playing tug training games is a great way to play body and mind games, all in one
This video provides you with a tutorial for teaching tug and release:
We want games to be fun but recognise that dogs need to learn some rules about playing with humans, especially because play can get very exciting.
Playing with toys for short periods is a great way to introduce reinforcers other than food rewards, while boosting your relationship with your pet and their joy in engaging with you. Bringing this game on the road is an excellent way to improve recalls and responsiveness while out and about.
Beginners:
Fetch games, although often loved by humans and found addictive by dogs, present some problems.
First of all, the repetitive, intense and exerting nature of fetch games can cause spikes in arousal so constant that they can raise the dog’s overall baseline for stress and being wound up, leading to other problems.
That’s why it becomes ‘addictive’ and dogs can’t seem to get enough, bringing about all sorts of high stress behaviours. Watch your dog’s behaviour the next time you play – note their intensity for the ball, the hard panting, tight mouth, possibly with vocalising and barking…all associated with such levels of arousal that the dog may be losing control.
Second, the dog is being rewarded for moving away from their human. There is such a disconnect between dog and human, especially where those ball launcher devices are used.
We even see automated fetch devices available on the market now – no human needed 😦
To help make sure fetch games are actually fun and playful, while being beneficial for your dog’s behavioural health, we start by solidifying a ball release cue so that you can safely throw the ball again. Once that’s established, we can get the ball, have an obedience break and start the game going again.
This game works great with puppies and young dogs, and also dogs that are really into tug games who can happily switch between a tug toy and food rewards.
Advanced:
In lots of dog sports and training, we use different cues or signals to communicate to the dog what sort of reinforcer to expect, where it will show up and how it will be presented. This helps to refine training and communication, and makes things very clear and predictable for the dog.
For example, for Decker, “tug” means to bite the toy in my hand and I will hang on, “Geddit” means grab the toy on the ground (I should refine this more to indicate what will happen with the toy afterwards, whether to tug or run away with it or to return to me and so on), “thank you” always means relinquish an item, no matter what.
In this clip, we are working on “switch”, which means release one toy and tug the other.
You will see that I continue to prompt his behaviour with more established cues (“thank you” and “tug”) but he starts to learn that the new cue, “switch”, means there’s more fun to be had!
If your dog already has an established release cue, you can introduce a switch cue to add lots of fun to the game!
If your dog’s is a TUG-ADDICT, using your release cue to let the dog know to switch to another available toy, is a great way of teaching that release cue.
Say the release cue, reveal the other toy and make it live (wiggle it, jiggle it, make it irresistible) and when your dog switches, hide the first behind your back. Switch ever 3-5 seconds of tug.
Rollercoaster Game 1 Up & Down
Playing is exciting; it’s meant to be! And we can use play to have fun with our dog (obvs!) while also helping them develop a more rollercoaster approach to excitement. Incorporate Rollercoaster Games into every interaction and game you play with your dog so managing their own excitement becomes a way of life.
Rollercoaster Games are especially important for puppies and adolescent dogs, who often have difficulty controlling arousal and self-calming. This is because those systems are developing in young dogs so it’s a pretty challenging time for them.
Support that development with regular, brief Rollercoaster Games:
Play about three rounds of Rollercoaster Games per play session. Start with play and crazy for about a 3-count with a calming break of at least double that.
Always start with calm and end with calm.
Teach your dog that you freezing and crossing your arms across your chest is a cue to sit, or any four-on-the-floor behaviour, e.g. standing, lying down. This helps in our Go Wild/Freeze Rollercoaster Game, but also with polite greetings.
Your dog learns that a person with their arms crossed is a cue to sit, stand or lie down giving alternative behaviours to both the greeter and greetee. Polite greetings training often times involves training for humans and dogs!
Fold your arms across your chest, ask your dog to sit, stand or lie down and when they do reward. Repeat five times and then test it.
Fold your arms and wait for your dog. If they can’t do it, ask them to do the chosen behaviour and repeat a couple more times.
Soon your dog will be offering that behaviour when they see your arms folded.
Please be aware that not all jumping up in greeting situations is indicative of a comfortable happy dog.
Sometimes a dog is jumping up because they are overwhelmed by the interaction, because they are over-aroused, because they would like distance and relief.
Unless you are sure, don’t ask your dog to do any stationary behaviour when meeting a new person. To do so could risk them becoming less comfortable and feeling that they have to use escalated distance increasing signaling, such as freezing, growling, snarling, snapping or even biting, to gain relief from the interaction.
Rollercoaster Game 2 Go Wild/Freeze
You can use a toy for this one if you like, but it’s not necessary. I often use this game as one without toys, so that I can turn crazy on and off, any place, any time.
If Deck and I have been engaged in some precision work, or he’s had to inhibit his Decker-ness for a time, we will play this on/off switch game so that he has an outlet for some crazy, but we can maintain some level of control.
do what ever it is that brings the crazy: move about, play tag, allow them to bark and spin and jump (if you find that ok)
count out 3 seconds of crazy
stop, freeze, fold your arms
If your dog can’t sit, stand or lie down, you might give them a hint by using the verbal cue or other signal for that behaviour.
reward your dog, in that position, for 10 seconds
reward with a food reward delivered one after another
Repeat no more than three rounds of this game and then give your dog something to help them calm, such as a Stuffable.
Your dog doesn’t have to do a sit. You can reinforce any four-on-the-floor behaviour such as just standing or lying down. It’s up to you, and your dog!
Practice matwork in short sessions of a few minutes at a time. If your dog is fidgety or finding it difficult to settle, work for shorter periods and practice more Parking to help them build some duration first.
It’s often better to use less exciting food rewards for matwork so that your dog isn’t too wound up by the anticipation of yummy food.
Beginners: teaching down
Start by teaching your dog to lie down on their mat.
Use the same mat for this work and tidy it away when you’re not training. Initially, we want the mat to be associated with rewards so if it’s just lying there at other times, it starts to use some value.
If you want to progress to teaching your dog to lying down on a verbal cue, this clip will bring your through the stages.
To help your dog relax, teach them to lie down in a more relaxed position. What happens on the outside of the body can help affect what’s happening on the inside; more relaxed behaviour can help the dog feel more relaxed.
Once your dog can lie down on the mat, we can begin to establish lying on the mat as the place to be. Note that we don’t need to ask the dog to lie down on their mat; we want the mat to be the signal to lie down there.
Practice some shaping exercises. Shaping is an approach to teaching that breaks the big, goal behaviour down into small achievable steps. We’ve given your dog a headstart as we have already taught them to lie on the mat. Now we are going to let them work it out a little.
Now that the dog can find their mat and lie on it, we can begin to further establish that idea by practicing this exercise. Take the mat up between each trial when you toss the treat away for the dog to get. When they return, lay out the may again so they can practice lying on it immediately.
If they can’t quite do that, just go back to practicing easier exercises. Your dog is giving you information that they need more practice and more support.
Your dog can lie on their mat and they know that lying on their mat is the place to be…now let’s make lying on the mat for longer and longer durations more and more rewarding.
We will use a technique referred to as 300 Peck to build duration. This is a reward-system that helps us build duration in behaviours by always working within the dog’s abilities.
Start with your dog lying happily on their mat. Start every session with five rewards, one after another, delivered on the mat. Instead of tossing a reward off the mat to reset, start our counting game:
Count 1, reward on the mat
Count 1, 2, reward on the mat
Count 1, 2, 3, reward on the mat
Count 1, 2, 3, 4, reward on the mat
And so on…
If your dog gets up, go back and start at one again. But instead of getting into a cycle of breaking, just practice up to five using 300 Peck. And then work on sessions up to ten, then up to 20 and so on.
Your dog is learning lots, just with these simple exercises: they are learning that the mat is the place good things happen, they are learning that them just lying there makes rewards happen, they are learning to lie on the mat for longer and longer, and we are thinning out the number of rewards so they are learning to lie on their may for longer durations between rewards.
Rollercoaster Game 3 Matwork
Start calmly working on building during in a down on the mat and end calmly too. In the middle go from down on the mat to crazy and back about three times.
The calm bit should be at least twice the duration of the crazy bit. At the beginning of training, crazy should last 3-5 seconds.
Incorporate sniffing into your game to help with rollercoaster effects and increase the sensory complexity in games and interactions.
Incorporate this into any game that you play with your dog.
Playing fetch games, throw the ball once or twice. Take a sniffing break. You might even hide the ball and have your dog sniff it out; it doesn’t need to be exerting fetch every time.
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 56 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
Every Sunday during #100daysofenrichment is Sunday Funday! This means you and your pet repeat your favourite challenge or challenges from the week.
You can do it exactly as you did first time round, you can try a different option, build on your progress already established, reinvent and rejig it…what ever you want to do with the last week of challenges!
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 55 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
Saturdays during #100daysofenrichment are all about emphasising the dog in all our dogs; all about sniffing and doing dog things.
Today we are going to formalise searching and hunting a little, by setting up courses specifically for sniffing and finding a particular hide.
For our work today, we are going to be searching for food rewards or toys, but this training may be more and more formalised and the dog learn to search for specific odour, for example.
Let’s keep it fun and light, rather than competitive, and have our dogs search for their favourite foods or toys.
We have already worked on putting sniffing on cue, now the cues are going to be the obstacles on our course.
Sniffing courses don’t need to be elaborate. Just 3 or 4 obstacles and you’re set! (Clip)
How The Nose Knows
Air is inhaled and warmed and humidified. Scent chemicals are processed by sensory cells via cila (tiny projecting hairs) that extend into the nasal cavity, with cilla housing numerous scent receptors and each scent receptor has tens of connections delivering messages to the olfactory bulb.
That cross section shows the turbinate bones, a beautiful network of scrolling bones that are lined with scent detecting tissue.
For this complex system to work, the dog’s nose must be moist and lubricated. The philtrum, which is the tiny crack running from the dog’s top lip to its nose, will move fluid up from the mouth to the nose via capillary action.
That’s why it’s important that water is always available for your dog during sniffing activities.
Dogs have a much greater surface area within the nasal cavities than humans. This nasal cavity tissue is covered in sensory cells, well over 125 million (we, pathetically, have about 5-10 million!). This huge amount of input can use to a third of the dog’s brina power when they sniffing.
Not only that, but they have two olfactory (sniffing) systems! The vomeronasal organ doesn’t link up with the olfactory bulb, like the nose does, and instead links up with the accessory olfactory system.
The Scent Puzzle
To understand the sort of puzzle you are setting your dog, and to get a little understanding of the puzzling they undertake when sniffing, having an understanding of how scent works can be helpful.
The scent plume is the shape created by airflow as the scent becomes weaker the further it moves from source.
Airflow moves scent and scent diffuses from the source in a scent cone.
Airflow will be affected by windows, doors, heaters and so on.
layout of area
Height of the ceiling and the room shape will affect airflow and the scent puzzle. Scent will diffuse around the space.
The scent will pool in corners, bouncing off the floor, walls and ceiling.
ambient temperature
Heat distributes scent and cold contains scent.
surfaces
Scent may soak into softer surfaces as it passes over them and it will pass more smoothly over shiny surfaces.
Damp areas may retain scent for short periods.
obstacles
Scent will travel around, through, over, and under obstacles. If it can’t, scent will travel upwards and then fall down again causing pooling.
Scent will move smoothly over round, smooth obstacles and angled obstacles will cause scent to travel up and over the top of the item, circling (turbulence) before falling away on the other side, causing pooling.
disturbance
Someone walking in the area will disrupt the scent cone. As you move about the sniffing course, think about you might disrupt the scent. When organising the sniffing course and moving obstacles, move several about. When you move or disrupt an obstacle, you cause a disturbance of the scent and if you just move one obstacle, the target obstacle for example, the dog may learn just to seek out disturbance rather than odour.
Setting up Searches
For our sniffing courses today we will be using food and familiar items, the dog’s toys.
You need only use very small amounts of food and it’s a good idea to use food that your dog really likes, to motivate them to work out that scent puzzle.
If you can smell the search item, then your dog will find it very strong and possibly even aversive. Very strong scents can overwhelm the scent receptors, making it harder for the dog to source the hide.
Use a specific plastic or metal tub or container for your searches. Put your search items, the food or toy, into the tub and hide that.
This prevents you contaminating obstacles with odour, which will confuse and frustrate your dog.
In scent based sports, there’s a lot of talk about the dog’s indication. This is the behaviour the dog shows when they have found odour.
For our purposes, indications don’t really matter as the dog can source the target immediately, and eat it or play with it. But, it can be fascinating exercise to observe your dog closely and learn to ready him or her.
What might tell you that your dog is on to the target scent? Your dog might go still, become more focused, close their mouth, do a double take, change speed of movement or tail change and you might observe air scenting.
When choosing a search area, check it carefully before bringing the dog in and beginning the search.
Check for cables, sockets, glass, sharp objects or corners, machinery or moving parts, nails or staples, hot surfaces, slippery surfaces, hazardous substances, distractions from scents; even things like doors or steps can cause the dog to bring their head up suddenly, striking it.
Check each obstacle that you use too.
Always play safe!
Designing searches
Arrange the obstacles in a sort of rough circle. This will keep odour within a smaller search area so that it makes for a better puzzle and teaches your dog to stay within the course, rather than needing to search the entire space.
Having each obstacle facing or opening in toward the centre of the circle will contain scent and make for a more fun and straight forward search.
Think about the scent puzzle before introducing your dog.
We can’t possibly imagine what it’s like to live in an olfactory world, like our dogs. But, we can understand the way scent moves, a little, by imagining it to be like the flow of water.
Stand in the room or space where you will set up your course. Picture water seeping into the room from all the available gaps, and as it flows in, how it moves about the space. What does it do when it meets an obstacle?
How does it behave when it hits a wall or door?
This example shows the movement of fog to represent how odour might move in a space and around obstacles:
Ideally, work with your dog off lead, but if that’s not safe, use a long lead and hold it without tension. Walk behind your dog so as not to disturb the scent.
When just starting out, the dog might be unsure of what they are doing. Make the first searches really obvious and it’s not a big deal if the dog finds the hide visually. Just let them learn that this set-up means the reward is available; soon they will start to search for it.
If the dog is really stuck, walk across the sniffing course, close to the hide. This will usually draw them across the scent plume and helps them to catch it and follow their nose again.
Don’t be concerned if they begin to manipulate or play with the obstacles. This is normal exploratory behaviour and may be very enriching for them. Make the food or toy really easy to find so that they begin to go directly to work, with some practice.
Keep your dog out of sight while you set up. I find that, with one course set-up, I can move the hide around 3-5 times. Each time, I reset the dog elsewhere, go back and set up and then release the dog to search again.
You can use your sniffing cue, or develop a new one for this game; lots of people who compete in scent based sports, use the verbal cue “Google!“, which I think is perfect!
As soon as your dog finds the hidden food, move in and drop a couple more treats in the same spot. This encourages the dog to stay at source a little longer, and rewards them for working hard.
Sniffing courses are especially wonderful for puppies and shy dogs. The dog is encouraged to interact with its environment, with weird things that are set-up and they get to take the lead. This is their thing, that they excel at.
This boosts their confidence and allows them to navigate their world on their terms.
Start easy and to raise criteria, increasing the challenge, you can add a minor bump in difficulty by adding one of the following at a time:
hide in smaller boxes; while bigger boxes dilute the scent, they create a bigger scent cone
use height – as soon as odour is off the floor, the dog will find it much more difficult so add height carefully and sparingly
obstacles in the scent cone
lay hides in corners, at the start line, in the middle of the area, along the perimeters
close or turn boxes
But for maximum fun and sniffing enjoyment, keep it simple and the dog successful. Sniffing courses should be about the dog winning!
Sniffing on cue
We don’t need to teach our dogs to sniff; they got that down. But, we can teach them the meaning of a specific signal: see this set up…sniffing for food.
Cues (or antecedents) are the things that tell an animal to do a behaviour because it results in reinforcement (or tells them to avoid a behaviour that results in punishment). All behaviours are naturally cued by things that happen around the animal and teaching is about helping the animal learn the meaning of cues we introduce.
Cues can be sounds, words, hand signals, gestures or other environmental signals, like our sniffing course set-up; anything that the dog can perceive.
Different types of cues work better in different environments, for different dogs, and for different behaviours.
Today’s challenges will rely on environmental cues – your sniffing course set-up.
Sniffing for food
Ideally, we would like our dogs to be sniffing out their regular meals, as much as possible. But, some dogs will need a little help to get them going and we can have our dog sniffing for treats too!
Kibble is a pretty versatile food type for enrichment type feeding, and works well for this exercise.
You can add kibble in with other yummier treats and toss those. Or you can make a Training Mix so that kibble smells and tastes yummier, but without having to add extra calories or other foods, should the dog be sensitive or restricted.
You can improve the smell/taste of kibble by grilling it a little, so that it becomes crunchier and oilier. You might also soak it in stock or other flavouring.
Wet and fresh foods can be a little more challenging:
Fresh meats and meat mixes (e.g. raw and home prepared diets) – cut up into small pieces, boiled or baked, frozen in small ice cube trays or pyramid baking mats for small individual treats.
Alternatively, you could use dried or semi-moist meats and cut them into small pieces for tossing. (Note that you feed a smaller volume of dried or dehydrated foods as they are more concentrated.)
Wet feeds (e.g. canned foods) – frozen in small ice cube trays or pyramid baking mats for small, individual treats.
Don’t forget fruit and vegetables too, if you’re dog likes them. Frozen peas are one of Decker’s favourite for sniffing!
Your challenge
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
Welcome to Day 54 of #100daysofenrichment and thank you for joining us on this journey!
Although our challenges are directed mainly at dogs, we want all species to enjoy and benefit from #100daysofenrichment so, please join in, adjust and adapt to help your pet or companion live a more enriched life.
Now it’s your turn to get creative! Every Friday is Freestyle Friday. We’ll give you the ingredients for a puzzle or enrichment device and you build it.
Rules:
you must use all the ingredients
you can add anything else you like, or nothing at all
You can add food or toys or anything else appropriate, if you like. Or you can use this as it is.
We can’t wait to see what fun and brain games you and your pet get up to with this one!
Your challenge
Now it’s your turn. Show us what you and your pets, of any species, can do with these challenges!
Post to your social media accounts, using the #100daysofenrichment so that we can find you and join our Facebook group to share your experiences, ideas and fun!
You can comment right here too 🙂
We look forward to hearing from you and your pets – have fun & brain games!
AniEd Ireland 