Take a look at this one-second video. What do you think is happening?
In an instant, it looks as if Emilie the Dobermann is done with her toy and pushing it off the dog couch. She looks a little sassy, doesn’t she? But that’s looking through the human-centric lens. What is really happening is a misfire in Emilie’s innate behavior. That behavior is caching, or burying, usually food, to dig up at a later date when hungry.
When Dobermann Emilie first arrived, I gave her some stuffed toys. Her caching instinct took over, and not having any earthy material to bury the things with, she used air.
This board-and-train pooch is a Miniature Schnauzer named Henry. He’s a picky eater and routinely caches his food with air and blankets.
You can see why these behaviors are misfires. Caching is an instinct deeply embedded in animals. When pickings are low, animals survive by eating those leftovers they’ve cached. Feeding instincts have kept animals alive far back into time and are unlikely to fade away even though most dogs are fed regularly and don’t need to cache their food. Those hard-wired feeding behaviors are still in them waiting to be expressed and when a dog’s impulse takes over, the result can be entertaining.
Helen Verte Schwarzmann
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Certified in Training and Counseling
Certified Pet Dog Trainer-Knowledge Assessed
Certified Trick Dog Instructor
AKC Canine Good Citizen/CGC and STAR Puppy Trainer and Evaluator
Your Board-and-Train Dog Trainer for Fort Myers, Lee county, Naples, Collier county, and southwest Florida
