Discovery Walks

We won't bore you too much with the science, but a dog's nose possess up to 300 million olfactory receptors, compared to about 6 million in us. And the part of a dog's brain that is devoted to analysing smells is about 40 times greater than ours. This means they possess a sense of smell more sensitive than even the most advanced man-made instrument. It's even powerful enough to detect substances at concentrations of one part per trillion — in layman's terms, this is a single drop of liquid in 20 Olympic-size swimming pools. 

So when our dog is intently sniffing that lamp post, and you're trying to hurry along, they're not just sniffing - they are having a full on social interaction! Like us with our phones, our dogs are smelling who's been at the lamp post in the last 48 hours, and also gaining information such as what breed, sex and even how healthy they were at the time of passing! It's absolutely mind-blowing. 

Sometimes, we need to slow down and let our dogs have a walk at their pace. Gavin, our Cocker Spaniel, would need about half an hour to get a few hundred yards down our road if he had his way, he lives with his nose to the floor - but this is actually incredibly good for him! I can guarantee if he's had a good sniff on a walk, he'll be far more exerted than if we threw a ball at him for half an hour in the park. 

However, I am aware that this is just not practical sometimes. Kids especially do not have the patience to wait around whilst Coco the Cockapoo sniffs every bush in Tring - nor do busy adults who have places to be! This is where we can help.

We can take your dog out for 30 minutes, 1 hour or 2 hours and we won't just walk them around a park. This is an experience designed just for them! We will play various hide & seek games with super tasty treats (a firm favourite game of Gavin's), to allow them to use their powerful noses to hunt it out, and we can also implement some training such as loose lead walking or socialisation if required. We can also work on settling, an important but often overlooked area of training, to teach our dogs to simply sit and watch the world go by, rather than needing to interact every time. As sedentary as this sounds, the concentration and mental exertion needed from a dog to be able to sit and watch another dog or human walk past without interacting will wear them out mentally, meaning a happy & sleepy dog when they get home!