Mental Exercises for Dogs – Activities That Stimulate Your Dog

Food enrichment – letting your dog work for the food

In these exercises, the dog gets to use its natural need to search and find food. The advantage of these exercises is that they are easy to do indoors.

Bottle

Put a few kibble in an empty PET bottle and place it on the floor. The dog must then figure out how the bottle must be angled for the treat to fall out. Just make sure that the dog does not chew the bottle so that it can ingest pieces of plastic.

Saucepan

Let your dog figure out how to get a meatball or treat that's under an upside-down plastic jar or pot. To make it more difficult, put a lid on the pan that cannot be pushed off, but must be lifted upwards.

Additional activities with foraging enrichment: hide treats or serve the dog's meal in old cardboard boxes, give the dog its meal in a so-called "snuffle food", use food balls or activity toys

Scent enrichment: tap into your dog's primal sense

This type of exercise satisfies the dog's need to sniff, explore, and use its amazing sense of smell. It is also a great way to tire the dog out mentally and can be adapted to do both indoors and outdoors.

Treat search

Start indoors by having the dog sitting next to you. Throw a handful of treats on the floor and when you say "search", the dog should look for all the treats. Make it more difficult by putting out treats in a room when the dog is not with you and then letting the dog in to search. This can also be done outdoors in terrain where the treat is not nearly as easy to find and the dog really has to use its nose.

Additional activities with scent enrichment: person tracking (let someone in the family hide and let the dog track them down), simple nosework exercises where the dog learns to distinguish between different scents.

Cognitive Enrichment: Problem-Solving

In these exercises, the dog gets to use its brain and train patience, which is an important part of mental training for dogs.

Treats on the nose

This can be quite difficult for the dog at first. Start by placing a treat in front of the dog. Let the dog stand or sit still and wait for a "here you go". Make it more difficult by putting treats on the front paws of the dog that will quietly wait for your "here you go".

The hardest part is putting the treat on the dog's nose. Take candy with a flat surface that doesn't roll off too easily. It is extra good if the dog can "go ahead" with its nose and catch the treat before it falls to the floor. You can also build a stack of dog treats that the dog gets to balance for a little while. Don't be in too much of a hurry, concentration is the order of the day.

Clean

Teach the dog to put its own toys back in a basket. This is a bit like a light retrieving exercise. Throw a toy out on the floor for the dog to pick up and put in the basket. Use the "clean" command. Don't forget to reward the dog with treats when it drops the toy in the basket. When one toy works without problems, try two and then more toys before the reward comes. In the long run, the dog should be able to clean up its toys that it has spread out in the house.

Additional activities with cognitive enrichment: train new commands, teach your dog to distinguish between different toys, or teach your dog to imitate you.

Environmental enrichment: let your dog discover new things

In these types of exercises, you try to give the dog a more stimulating environment such as vantage points, hiding places, opportunities to dig, or new sounds, smells and surfaces.

Indoor obstacle course

Build a simple obstacle course out of pillows, chairs, blankets, and cardboard boxes. Let the dog jump over, crawl under, and walk around different objects. Feel free to vary the course and change things occasionally to keep it exciting.

Additional activities with environmental enrichment: fill a tub with water and put in toys or treats, offer the dog a lookout point or a digging corner in the garden.

Social enrichment:

Here it is about giving the dog the opportunity to interact with other dogs or people through play, training or social activities.

Practice a new trick

Such as spinning, giving paws, rolling around or backing up. During training, the dog gets to cooperate with you, read your body language and communicate to understand what you want. Reward with treats and praise when the dog succeeds!

Additional activities with social enrichment: play with other dogs, massage, cuddle time, play with owners.

Physical enrichment: using one's body

Activities that promote physical activity and exercise such as walking, balance training and other activities that are adapted to the dog's age and physical capacity. It can also include activities such as tracking and games that mimic hunting behavior.

Balance exercise

Let the dog stand with its front paws on a pillow, balance ball or low stool. It trains both body control and strength.

Additional activities with physical enrichment: walks on different surfaces, fetch games, simple agility exercises where the dog can jump over or crawl under something, tracking