What is Puppy Enrichment?
Puppy Enrichment is Vital to Healthy Development
When you get a puppy you may do some research on what's most important to have a happy healthy pup. You'll likely come across a lot of information telling you how crucial enrichment or enrichment activities are. Giving your pup enrichment is fairly easy to do, it's simply giving your puppy activities to keep their minds and bodies active and engaged. Some enrichment activities can take hours to complete while others take just a few moments. Giving them activities to do that use their natural instincts helps to develop their problem solving skills and build their ability to self-entertain making your life much easier. The best activities for young dogs include chewing, licking, or seeking. These behaviors are natural to your dog and give them a healthy way to use their energy.
Movement is Your Best Friend
Enrichment activities like moving food dispensing toys are a fantastic choice for new dog owners. These can easily be filled with your dog's kibble or treats and then meal time is instantly transformed into a game that can take some dogs a half hour to an hour to finish. The best thing about these types of enrichment toys is that they not only engage the mind, but they also engage the body. They have to move around to get the little pieces of food to fall out which not only takes brain power to figure out, but also gets them tired from all the moving around at the same time. If you identify with the saying "a happy dog is a good dog" then you can probably relate to how life changing a feeding toy like this can be. These come in numerous shapes, sizes, and difficulty levels. They can even be used for every meal if you'd like!
Puzzle Toys Help You and Your Puppy
Puzzle toys are another form of enrichment for your pup that not only benefit them, but also benefit you. These toys are designed to give your dog a puzzle to solve. While they usually don't require as much movement as a food dispensing toy, they do require much more brain power to figure out. Just like us humans after figuring out a really difficult problem, your puppy will be tired from this experience. Most puppies will be ready for a nap after solving one of these difficult puzzle toys. This gives you a chance to have a break from your constant supervision and entertaining which can truly be exhausting when their young. It's also important to note that you'll need to select the right difficulty level for your dog when choosing one of these toys.If it's too easy it'll be finished too quick. While there's no replacement for good training, there's still an enormous amount if benefits you will be able to noticeably see when using toys like these. Just like food dispensing toys, these can be filled with treats or kibble, making them a fun exciting way to feed your dog their meal every day. We recommend that every new dog parent should stock up on a variety of puzzle toys for their new pup!