Nosework Intro

What is Nosework?

Nosework is an activity where the dog seeks out scents in the environment using their nose. It provides mental stimulation, physical exercise, helps with problem solving, develops confidence and strengthens the bond between the two of you as you work together to find the scents.

The activity itself consists of your dog using their highly developed sense of smell (up to 300 million olfactory receptors in their noses compared to about 6 million in humans) to locate specific scents hidden in various environments.

My favorite part about it is that it provides a workout that is more appropriate than soley focusing on physical exercise, like walks where your dog doesn’t get to engage with the environment.

Why does it tire out our dogs so much?

Nosework requires concentration and mental effort as the dog must focus on different smells, follow scent trails, and distinguish between various scents to find the target odor. That means their noses and brains are working even harder.

There is also problem solving involved. They must figure out where the scent is coming from, how to access it, and sometimes even overcome obstacles to reach the target odor.

While nosework primarily involves mental stimulation, there is a physical aspect to it as well. Dogs often have to navigate through different terrains, search in various locations, and sometimes even climb or crawl to reach the target odor.

How does it help build confidence?

Dogs that lack confidence may experience anxiety in new or unfamiliar situations. Nosework can help alleviate this anxiety by giving them a familiar and engaging activity that focuses their attention on scent detection rather than their fears.

Intro to Nosework

This is my version of the non-competitive, just for fun, finding treats game. If you are interested in actually taking classes and possibly earning titles chances are there is a facility in your area that can help you get started. Just ask your favorite internet search engine.

What you’ll need:

• 3-4 Boxes sized appropriately for your dog. They should be able to stick their head inside easily and eat treats.
  • Remove the flaps, or fold them inside.
• Treats!
• An assistant to hold your dog or an area you can move your dog to when you need to reload & move boxes.

How To Play

Interacting and/or eating out of a box might be new for your dog. They may hesitate to put their head inside. If they walk away that is ok. Go at their pace and don’t force the fun!

• Starting with one box, place a few treats inside and put the box on the floor.
• Let your dog investigate at their own pace.
• Once they start eating the treats start to drop in a few more, one at a time, so they keep eating.
• Pick up the box and repeat a few times until they are comfortable eating from it and starting to get a little excited when you place the box down.
• Add a second EMPTY box and put the treat in the first box.
  • Your dog should investigate the second box. But it’s ok if they don’t.
• This is a good time to start moving your dog to another area after they’ve found the treat so you can add more boxes.
• You can also change which box has the treat to encourage your dog to investigate the others.
• Walk around and drop a treat into the other boxes, preferably without your dog seeing which. Or have your assistant move your dog into another room while you move boxes around.
• Other variations:
  • Place boxes on its side, stack them, place in maze-like patterns, “tent” positions, place them on chairs.
  • Take the game outside!