Go Dogs, Go!

Dogs just wanna have fun

Time outside the kennel, with and without human companions, offers some of the best opportunities for canine enrichment:

• The dogs get much needed exercise, which helps tire them out so that they are more relaxed in their kennels.
• Social dogs enjoy the company of other dogs.
• Dogs have the opportunity to exhibit natural behaviors, such as running, digging, following scents, and playing.
• Being outdoors stimulates all of the dogs’ keen senses, which is naturally satisfying to them.

All dogs benefit from play time, but it is especially valuable for high-energy dogs, such as working and bully breeds, who are particularly challenged by confinement in a kennel.

Once a week, Mackenzie’s dogs spend 30-60 minutes exploring a two-acre enrichment yard. This yard has a small pond, a climbing mountain, steps, and barrels with the bottoms cut out for dogs to crawl through.

Materials

• A secure, fenced area where dogs can be off leash
• Features that provide interest to dogs: structures to crawl through, wading pools, areas where dogs can dig, toys, scents

People

Staff or trained volunteers to escort the dogs to the exercise yard and keep an eye on their activities.

What to Do

Because this is unstructured play time, the bulk of the work for you involves setting up the spaces and creating a schedule for dogs to use them. You want to ensure that all dogs have:

• A daily opportunity to play in the exercise yard for at least an hour
• A 30-60 minute session in an enrichment yard at least once a week

If your facility has limited outdoor space (not everybody has a two-acre back yard), you can experiment with varying the enrichment opportunities in the space you do have:

• Hide toys and treat-filled Kongs for the dogs to discover.
• Fill a wading pool for splashing.
• Set out large Jolly Balls or other sturdy balls. Herding dogs often choose to herd and roll these balls around. Bully breeds tend to use the balls for rough play.
• Set out rope toys for dogs who like to play tug-of-war.
• Create scent trails using raw meat dragged on the ground or purchased animal scents, such as those available in garden-supply stores, sprayed at intervals through the yard. (Mackenzie’s had this clever idea and haven’t implemented it due to time constraints. ASPCA behaviorists think scent trails would be very popular with your shelter’s scent hounds and other dogs who choose to interact with olfactory enrichment.)

And some dogs will create their own fun. Here’s a video of a lively Mackenzie’s resident using his free time to engage in bug hunting:

As with other activities, note things the dogs interact with and those they ignore. This enables you to fine-tune the yard setup so that it is as engaging as possible.

Photo and video courtesy of Mackenzie’s Animal Sanctuary