Hey Woofa’s,

I have a lot of people telling me how annoying it is when they take their dog for a walk and all the dog wants to do is sniff and pee!

Billy does this when we go walking with him and I don’t think it’s that much of a bother.

He sniffs, does a bit of a pee and keeps going.

However as people we are becoming more and more obsessed with social media!

I mean I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen people walking their dog and they’re too busy on their phones to even notice their dog!!!

SERIOUSLY!!

Everybody ALWAYS says how busy they are, how they don’t have time to do anything, yet everyone is on their phones ALL THE TIME!!

They pretty much missing what’s going on around them!

Not out dogs though, they’re tuned in to their environment and here’s why!

WHY IT’S A GOOD IDEA TO ALLOW YOUR DOG TO SNIFF AND PEE WHILE OUT ON A WALK?

Dogs are scent orientated.

Their sense of smell is phenomenal, something as humans we will never fully understand or appreciate.

To get a clearer picture on just how phenomenal click here!

I did a 5 part series on our dog’s senses and this one is on smell.

Now just as people feel the need to keep in touch via their phone on social media, what is it you think your dog is doing when peeing and sniffing??

LET’S LOOK AT SNIFFING!

Did you know that humans have around 6 million smell (olfactory) receptors in our noses?

Dogs however have roughly 300 million!!!!!!

How amazing is that?

Dogs interpret their world mostly through their noses while humans generally do this through their eyes.

So imagine if every time you went to look at your phone someone tugged on your lead and pulled you away from it.

Or if every time you wanted to watch TV or while out walking and taking note of your environment, someone pulled you away from doing it!!!!!

How annoying RIGHT?

Humans acclimatize to smell, we smell something but as soon as the smell is gone, we move on.

Dogs can register the same smell for hours, days and sometimes weeks later.

A dogs sense of smell is so superior they can pick up smells that even hard core equipment can’t even begin to register.

Why else would they be used for military work, police work, border security work, search and rescue work, assistance work with people who suffer seizures etc?

Dogs can even sniff out cancer!!

This is why it’s a good idea to allow your dog to sniff while out on a walk because they are learning so many things about their environment.

We always allow Billy to sniff along the way we walk him because (hopefully it NEVER happens) if he happened to get out one day, I’m hoping his sense of smell from his environment will help him to find his way home!!!!

Again your dog’s sense of smell is amazing.  They are picking up so much information via their nose it’s not funny.

Please allow them to sniff.

LET’S LOOK AT PEEING!

As I said above, dogs are scenting creatures.

Which means while they like to sniff, they also like to scent aka pee (and poop)!

Have you ever noticed after your dog has done a poop in an area that’s NOT their backyard they flick their back feet out like they’re flicking grass over their poop?

This is basically another form of scenting (aka ground scratching) they’re flicking their scent where they have been in a form of communication to other dogs.

Billy doesn’t do this  when he goes in our backyard, but I’ve definitely seen him do it while we’ve been on a walk (and yes I did pick up his poop)!

Also when Dog Grooming dogs sniff around the front lawn, I’ve seen them flick/kick back their back legs in this scenting motion as well.

Which has me believing that it is a form of communication.

Also the salon dogs pee all over the front bushes near our letter box, so much so I call it the ‘internet cafe for dogs’!

I can guarantee that they all stop and sniff and pee in the same areas.

Same when out for a walk, we allow Billy to pee along the way so if he ever came back that way he can smell his own pee.

This is also sending information out to other dogs.

So again please allow your dog to ‘scent pee’ while they are out on a walk.

SIDE NOTE!

I can hear many of you saying, yeah but my dog sniffs and/or pees obsessively on anything and everything while we’re on a walk!

Yes for some it can be obsessively and can be annoying when you’re trying to get them to walk.

Either, take them on a sniffing/peeing adventure one day, then the next don’t allow them to do it as much.

I mean some people call doing it more than once obsessive, that’s not obsessive.

Obsessively sniffing and peeing is when you can’t even get a walk in because every metre or so your dong is doing it.

If it’s like that every walk, then yes some training needs to occur.

But bare in mind if you stop them every time from doing it, you’re robbing them of becoming familiar with their environment.

It’d be like if someone kept blind folding you every time you wanted to  look at something!!!

WHAT DOES ALL THIS MEAN?

It’s a good idea to allow your dog to sniff and pee while out on a walk because it helps them to gather information on their environment as well as to make decisions based on that information.

IN THE COMMENTS BELOW – BILLY WOULD LIKE TO KNOW – IF YOUR DOG SNIFFS AND PEES WHILE OUT ON A WALK?