Some of our clients have recently asked us, "How do I get my dog to not sniff so much?" Our answer is we can teach your dog to not sniff a lot, but why would you want to? Our canine companions have an amazing sense of smell. How does it compare to ours? Well for one, they have 300 million olfactory receptors while we only have 6 million. Where we smell a stew, they can smell each individual ingredient in that stew. James Walker, former director of the Sensory Research Institute at Florida State University, who, with several colleagues, stated, "If you make the analogy to vision, what you and I can see at a third of a mile, a dog could see more than 3,000 miles away and still see as well."
In our opinion, smell is one of the reasons dogs enjoy their walks so much, so why take that away from them? Dr. Alexander Horowitz has a great Ted Talk and a book, "Being a Dog" that is a great read if you want to learn more about how your dog uses that sniffer. It may change your thinking and you may find yourself "sniffing" your world just a bit more.
