10,460 answers about dogs
From a puppy’s first feeding schedule to a senior dog’s comfort care, dog owners ask it all — this page gathers the dog library of KinsLe Answers in one place. Browse by topic below, from feeding and training to health, grooming, safety and travel. Every answer is original, written by KinsLe, and tied to a real KinsLe feature.
885 answers in Behavior & Training — page 18 of 37
Persistent face licking is an over-enthusiastic greeting rooted in puppy behaviour: youngsters lick adult dogs around the mouth to show deference and ask for attention, and your dog is aiming that same appeal at the faces visitors bend toward her. Redirect it by teaching a greeting with a job in it, such as sitting…
Your dishwasher is, to your dog, a warm rack of plates that still carry traces of gravy, butter and everything else from dinner, so licking the door and crockery as you load is opportunistic tasting with a strong scent reward. Redirect it by giving him a job before the door opens: send him to a mat with a chew, load…
Leaning her full weight into a visitor and sighing is usually a calmer, more mature greeting than jumping: she is seeking close contact and reassurance while keeping her paws on the floor, and the sigh often comes as she relaxes into that contact. Many dogs swap bouncing for this press-and-settle style as they grow…
Two minutes feels instant to you and much longer to a dog who watches you walk away through glass, cannot follow, and is surrounded by fuel-station smells, engines and strangers passing the windows. Howling is his way of calling you back and releasing that spike of frustration and worry about being left. KinsLe…
Harmonicas and recorders sit in a pitch and breathy tone range that can sound surprisingly close to another dog howling, so your dog may be answering what his ears treat as a distant companion rather than joining in with music in general. Steady, sustained notes give him time to join, while most songs change pitch too…
Hiding treats in shoes, plant pots and laundry is caching, an old food-storing instinct that tells your dog a surplus is worth tucking away for later instead of eating straight away. It often shows up when a treat is large, especially tasty or offered when she is already full, and those soft, scent-holding spots feel…
Water feels different to her than food or toys because it is needed unpredictably, all day, and there is usually only one bowl in one place — so a housemate drinking can read as a vital supply being used up, especially if she is thirsty, hot, or has learned the bowl sometimes runs empty. Food guarding is absent…
He has picked his person — usually whoever feeds, walks, trains, and relaxes with him most — and following is how he keeps his best options open, because good things in his day reliably start near that person. It looks like dependence, but his settling happily when they are out tells the truer story: once the option…
Most grass-eating is ordinary grazing — many dogs simply like the taste and texture of fresh grass, eat it slowly, and never vomit at all. Vomiting tends to follow fast, gulping eating of long blades, especially on an empty stomach, because the blades tickle the throat and stomach; the grass is often the trigger of…
He has discovered that water makes his favorite toy more interesting: the ball bobs, drifts, splashes, and has to be fished out, which turns a simple carry into a self-made game he can restart anywhere he finds water. The toilet qualifies because it is an always-available bowl of water at head height, and your…
You are not restoring the bed — from her side, you are preparing it, because freshly turned soil is loose, cool, and full of released earth smells, it carries your scent from your hands, and digging in it last time was deeply satisfying, so the refilled bed is more inviting than the compacted one she originally…
A garden bowl is a different object from an indoor bowl: it sits on soft, diggable ground, warms in the sun, collects leaves and insects that move on the surface, and tips easily once she starts pawing at reflections or things floating in it. Digging in it lets her cool her paws and investigate at once, and a light…
On hot afternoons that bowl is the coolest, most interesting thing in the kitchen: digging splashes water over her paws and chest, which cools her, and many dogs also simply find moving water rewarding to paw at — the ripples, splashes, and your reaction all pay off. Heat is why it clusters on warm days rather than…
Digging and circling are a built-in bed-making routine — flattening, scent-marking, and arranging a sleeping hollow — and the long versions happen on nights when something is slightly off for her: the bed is too warm or freshly washed of her scent, she is still a little wired from the evening, or the room sounds…
She is not digging for company in general — she is digging for you specifically. Dogs form individual attachments, and if you are her main source of walks, feeding, training, and comfort, other people in the house are not an interchangeable substitute when a door puts you out of reach. The scratching also works often…
On winter evenings the two sides of the door offer opposite problems: outside is interesting — cold air, sharper scents, fox and cat trails, other dogs barking in the dark — but quickly chilly and exposed, while inside is warm yet boring once she has checked that nothing changed. So she samples both, and each trip out…
Book corners are almost designed to tempt a dog at nose height: layered paper gives way satisfyingly under her teeth, the cover holds the scent of your hands from hours of reading, and a low shelf puts the whole row at exactly the height she patrols. She is not choosing literature over her toys out of spite — the…
Your shoes win because they carry the strongest version of you — sweat, skin oils, and the day's outdoor smells soaked into leather and lining — while your partner's pair simply smells less interesting or less familiar to her. If you are also the person who feeds, walks, or plays with her most, your scent is the one…
A mop or broom head is a perfect toy-shaped provocation from floor level: it sweeps back and forth at her eye height, speeds up, pauses and darts into corners, its strands flaring like something alive, and it retreats when she lunges — the exact rhythm of a chase game. She is not mocking your housework; her chase…
Swimsuit-and-sprinkler time transforms children into your dog's perfect storm: they run fast in looping lines, they shriek, they are wet and slippery, and their usual clothes are replaced by bright swimwear and bare skin. Movement plus high voices plus novelty switches on her chase instinct in a way that calm, dressed…
To your dog, the robot vacuum earns the comparison: low to the ground, it moves on its own with sudden turns and pauses, bumps into furniture and reverses, humming at a pitch that rises and falls — a convincing small creature scuttling around his territory. Chasing and nipping it is prey drive and herding instinct…
The timing is the clue: when the puppy arrived, your dog's world gained a noisy, demanding newcomer, and one familiar toy — carrying her own scent, chosen by her — became her comfort object and her property statement in one. Carrying, mouthing and sleeping with a soft toy is self-soothing behaviour, a way to hold onto…
Your dog has learned that the lead is a magic object: present it to a person, and a walk may happen. Guests are her freshest audience — novel, delighted, quick to fuss her — and some guests really have taken her out before, so trying them first is good strategy, not a complaint about your walks. Channel it by keeping…
Hugs and dancing break the living room's normal rules in ways a dog finds hard to read: people stand chest to chest, arms wrap around each other, voices rise, and with dancing there is fast movement, spinning and laughter all at once. Your dog may be excited and trying to join in, worried that the close contact is a…
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