Boredom! Blog Twenty

Hard to believe it's been twenty blogs already! Wow!

Today's blog is about boredom - what it is, and how to fix it!

Most owners are usually fairly good at accomplishing the physical exercise needs of their dog - whether that means an hour a day, or an hour every four hours! Most of the time, we don't come across a dog with physical exercise being left unsatisfied - usually, in the cases where the client is at their wit's end with their pet, is when they have forgotten all about mental exercise!

Dogs have a few main basic exercise needs that must be accomplished for them to be satisfied every day. These are physical exercise, hunting exercise, traveling exercise, and mental exercise. Would it surprise you to learn that the LEAST of these is physical exercise? Taking a dog for a structured on-leash walk will accomplish physical, hunting, and traveling exercise, but mental is left in the dust. Any unstructured walks (such as letting them smell everything, pee a lot, wander off leash without boundaries, or not moving fast enough) will burn hunting energy, but will very rarely touch physical, mental, and traveling exercise. This is because a dog needs quick locomotion to focus on the travel, and the ability to "check in" to the exercise. When they "check out" by nosing the ground and such, they're only hunting. While the first example is better than the second by a long shot, neither will accomplish mental energy needs. Like a child, dogs need to use their minds to feel satisfied. Children have an innate need to learn and experience new things, and dogs are exactly the same. The only difference is, while your child can burn mental energy by coloring, reading, or watching educational TV, your dog relies 100% solely on you to help them burn their mental energy - and unfortunately, most of the time, owners are totally unaware of this need and don't address it.

When it isn't addressed properly, dogs become bored. While a closer term would be "mentally stagnant", its far simpler to call it boredom. When a dog understands they need to burn pent up mental energy, because they don't understand how to communicate their needs - so they are left to their own devices. What are the symptoms of canine boredom? Every dog is different, but here are the most common:

Symptoms of boredom:
-Pacing
-Barking/growling at nothing
-Destroying their toys or your things
-Disobeying commands, or slow to listen to them
-Challenging/dominating humans, your furniture, or your items.
-"Snacking" from their food or water bowl (if it is readily available - we do not condone free feeding, however this is an unfortunate reality in many homes).
-Running around the home for no reason
-Checking entrances and windows every few minutes
-Smelling the same spots in the house every few minutes
-Playing with a toy intensely
-Playing with a toy then suddenly stopping
-Napping in the daytime (if you have introduced night time as sleep time)

If one or more of these sound like your pet, especially after a walk or in the afternoon or evening, this is a sign your dog is bored. If your dog is waking up and producing these symptoms immediately, it is a sign that there has been several days - often months, or years - of pent up mental energy. Like physical energy, if it is not drained early in the day and done every day, it builds up and doesn't get released like it does with humans.

How do we release mental energy?

Its a lot simpler than it sounds - and you can accomplish it with very little effort on your part, compared to an hour of walking. If you spend 15-30 minutes doing the following whenever you can tell your dog is starting to go stir-crazy, you'll see a big difference in a matter of weeks - and sometimes, days! From the lightest burning (for light boredom) to the most intense (for built up energy), here is our list of mental energy solutions!

Solutions

-Take them to a new location - whether they're walking, or just experiencing it. As long as they've never been there before, this will make them think and analyze the area for scents, threats, and other dog-important things.

-Refining old behaviours by adapting them, and making them better or faster.

-Teach them a brand new skill, trick, or behaviour - something completely new or foreign.

-Tug with rules! By this, we mean a consistent start and stop, the ability to use "out" commands without a challenge, and the ability to control intensity without bribing or tricking the dog in any way.

-Engagement training - this will burn a dog out incredibly fast if it's done correctly. It has many other beneficial side effects as well, including fast command response, "bomb-proof" nerves of steel, high reward drive (meaning you can train your dog to go psycho over a toy and have them do anything for it), and can introduce complex behaviours, as well as ensure they will never ever react to anything strange, ever.

When we employ the right tools, we can fix almost any canine problem - it just takes a little understanding, and a little effort!