Enrichment- Does a Body Good

Definition of enrichment-

act of making fuller or more meaningful or rewarding  (thefreedictionary.com) The motivation behind this blog is an adolescent pit bull that lives down the street.  He is an outside dog that barks most of the day.  When I heard him barking one night, it made me think about what I do to enrich my dogs' lives and keep their minds stimulated. Zoos and aquariums put a lot of effort into the enrichment of their animals.  The Dallas Zoo stated the other day that they switched the cheetah and lion habitats.  This allowed the animals to have entirely different surroundings and scents.  I have seen big blocks of ice and chunks of fish inside of those blocks for polar bears.  Orangutans have been given the opportunity to play with Ipads in Wisconsin.  (Youtube Orangutan video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KGrXZ5pWko) So what can you do with your dogs? A great place to start is with their food.  One option is to put their food in a KONG or other treat dispensing toy so that it takes a little bit longer for them to eat it.  It also allows them to problem solve how to get the food out.  A couple of weeks ago I took a bit of our dog's kibble and put it in a paper towel roll.  I then folded the ends of the roll so you could hear the food inside, but you couldn't see it.  The dog had to rip open the roll to get the food.  You can also hide food in different places of the room so that dinner becomes a scavenger hunt. Dogs love to sniff.  Anytime you can hide something, it becomes so rewarding to find it.  There are tons of different dog puzzles that allow you to hide treats to give your dog the chance to find them.  Karen Pryor's site has a great assortment here: http://store.clickertraining.com/treat-and-puzzle-dog-toys.html Toys can also be great enrichment.  Try to cycle through their toys.  There shouldn't be free access to every single one of them or they will lose their excitement.  Make notes about which ones are high value.  Those can be saved for very special occasions.  And with any animal or child, the most reinforcing toys are the ones you spend very little money on.  Save those boxes or ropes, etc.  You never know if they will be your dog's favorite item. Enrichment is entertainment.  Imagine a world without your TV or phone or computer.  Our dogs rely on us to provide good enrichment opportunities and they usually don't take very much to implement.