Dear Toto,
I am exasperated with my
dog. I love Ben to death, but he
insists on finding every stinky thing in the yard possible, and then rolling
around in it. Since he has s white
coat, this is truly disgusting on a scent AND aesthetic level. Why on earth would any dog want to do
this and what can I do?
-- Fed up in Bishop, California
Hi Fed Up!
I guess we’re on kind of a
stinky theme this month, are we?
Okay fine. No problem.
I admit, this is one of the
grosser things that dogs do. And
no, it doesn’t make sense to humans.
But you know, there’s plenty of things that humans do that make no sense
to dogs. Like waxing.
BUT! The common scientific
explanation for why dogs like to roll around in stinky things is because back
when dogs were wild and roamed in packs and were considered more as hunters
than cute cuddly things that you sit on the couch with, rolling around in a
stinky mess would help hide our natural scent from the things that we were
tracking. So our prey would catch a whiff, and think “Hey, that sure smells
awful over there. Thank God it’s not a dog,” and they’d relax and then we’d
POUNCE, and the chase is on.
Those days are long behind
us, but the instinct is still ingrained within our DNA. Nowadays when we do it, it’s more like,
“Oh my GOSH! Can you believe this
pile of mess I found!? Nobody’s
gonna believe this! I’d better
roll around in it and take it back to show everyone so they too can be amazed
at the utter STENCH OF THIS STUFF!”
In other words, it’s the
human equivalent of a frat boy calling his brothers into the bathroom to look
at the amazing poop he just took.
Yep, it’s gross. But seriously, can you BELIEVE THIS
THING!
P.S., when you google the
phrase, “Why do dogs roll around in dead animals, this picture of Russell Brand
also came up. Which is hilarious to me, so I had to include it. CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS THING!?”
Thanks for the question!
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