Is your Dog a Roller?
Why do some dogs love to roll in stinky stuff, and can training help?
If your dog could talk…
Ask yourself this, if your dog could talk, what would be the first thing you would ask them? Think of all those burning questions in those challenging or beautifully emotive moments together! Even better, tell me in the comments box below this post, I would be really interested to know! My first question would be Why do you like to roll in stinky stuff? How about you? Is your dog a roller?
Some of you who know me might know about my recent adventure into the sea – don’t worry only shin-deep – to clean off my four-legged companion. You see, my dog rolled in a decaying seal carcass on the beach. Really rolled. The smell was indescribable. And he looked so pleased with himself. Look at me! Wanna sniff? Of course it was comedy, but I did need to remember our “calming anchors” before I took a deep breath and decided what we had to do. Lead on, we cheerfully walked into the sea together…
For Roller owners, mysterious forests, sand dunes or just a patch of grass can hide something to be rolled in.
A Dog Roller: amateur or professional?
Let’s first of all discount what I would call the amateur rollers. Dogs going down and rubbing themselves along some silky grass because it feels, well, presumably silky and nice, is at the bottom of the scale. It might just be playful, or a precursor to rolling on their back in the sun. Rolling in a little mud because they like it or to clean themselves off or even attempt to rid themselves of parasites is a step up. Likewise having a roll in a puddle to have a clean or to cool off. All perfectly ordinary.
Now, for the professional roller, such things are merely rehearsals for the real thing! Not for them some benign mud or water. A dedicated roller will either seek out or significantly divert their path to find something organically marked (poo) or deceased. Fox poo is a common one in these parts.
Scent hounds, of course, are by their nature beguiled by odours. A bloodhound’s long, floppy ears even help to catch and waft the tiny odour particles into their face to help maintain the tracking. Breeding and evolution are powerful things… But your dog doesn’t have to be a scent hound to be really attracted to the stinky stuff. So why is this?
Scent as Information
We all know dogs live by smell, their nasal receptors amplifying the messaging to their brain to a degree us humans cannot remotely fathom. Odour carries a lot of information. This can be information about where the smell has been, where it has come from, literally what it is, or even who it is. A dog can be thoughtful, fearful or excited by a smell and the information it contains. Most of the time they simply process the information and move on (or leave their own scent before doing so). But some smells are so intense that it seems to awaken a more primal urge in a dog, and it is this we want to understand when we talk about the Roller. We don’t know exactly why of course because our dogs can’t talk (see question at the beginning!), but there are some good theories…
Motive
We always need to establish motive at the scene of the crime. Because we are talking about primal motives, let’s look at our domestic dog’s ancestors: wild canids and wolves. These theories can be complimentary, in other words, a wolf might roll in something stinky for more than one reason.
To Mask Their Own Scent. This idea is that when hunting prey, a wolf would disguise itself by rolling in something else that smells strong and not like a wolf. This doesn’t account for the prey still becoming alarmed by something stinky approaching, but still, there’s some logic to this idea.
To Leave Their Own Scent. Another theory is that a wolf becomes excited by the strong smell and therefore wishes to “join in” and leave their own scent on the dead thing. This would be to “claim” it as theirs’, perhaps ideally to return to it again and ward off other competitors. This too is logical, especially for carcasses. Probably less so for organic “inanimate” targets more commonly found today like fox poo. But marking that anyway might be satisfying.
To Convey Information. Wolves are pack animals and feed together. If one came across a carcass, rolling in the scent conveys the information back to the pack: “Hey, look what I found!” Or perhaps simply just to convey the information for its own sake: “Guess what I found!”
All these motives would potentially leave genetic markers in our modern pooches, no question. But there is also another possible reason:
They Like It. They just really enjoy or are excited about the smell. Do you need another reason? Let’s be honest, dogs are animals. They do a lot of things that humans find unpalatable, so why not?
Opportunity
How your dog behaves after the crime has been committed might give you some clues about the motive, but we still need the opportunity in the first place. Now we put our training hat on, because this is all about access to a resource, much like any other thing your dog may find desirable. We can train Recall, Wait, Leave and have an arsenal of diversionary techniques. We should do all these things anyway. But the most effective thing is managing the opportunity. You can’t see fox poo at a distance, fair enough, but when you do come across it, there is likely to be more in the vicinity. And it could remain ‘fresh’ for a few days. So next time, avoid that patch of grass!
Or if you’re on the beach like me, you might be able to spot the suspicious humps shallow-buried in the sand or recognise the suspicious profile. If you do see it before your dog smells it – that’s when you want to do a recall or a diversion. For me I didn’t clock it in time, but I have done before. So, let’s at least give ourselves a chance by being aware of our surroundings. (And keeping shampoo in the car.)
Be kind: we like different things
The most important thing is not to punish your dog or make them feel somehow ashamed. Yes, we might find it absolutely not funny at the time (maybe funny later). But your dog will only understand that you are angry and not associate this with the primal thing they are programmed to do. At the other end of the scale, but less likely, is to reward them for doing this by somehow adding to the excitement. Remember your dog will be in a very aroused state with that smell now on their coat. So having bitten my lip, I remained calm when I put the lead on and led my dog for a bath in the sea. Oh, look at you! Okay, let’s play a different game now and have a wash.
Incidentally, why do you like doing that?
So back to our question, what would be the first thing you ask them?
