De Ritter Joanna - Brain teasers for dogs: quick and easy homemade puzzle games

This book contains a variety of original games, in which your dog will have to apply paws, nose and lots of gumption. Your four-legged friends brain will certainly be challenged. In order to receive a treat or his favourite toy, he will first have to crack various puzzles: operate a downpipe, try his luck with a board game, reel in a dog fishing line or literally think outside the box.

You already have all the necessary equipment for infinite puzzle fun at home. It lies dormant in the form of everyday household objects in the kitchen, cellar, garage and attic waiting to be used as brain teaser equipment. There is no need to buy anything special, hardly any need to make anything (there are things even people with limited DIY skills can easily put together) and you can throw yourself straight into the fun.

It makes no difference whether you and your dog have any previous experience nor does it matter if you think of your four-legged friend as intelligent or not. It is also irrelevent whether you are both young or old, big or small, physically fit or less mobile.

If you are completely new to it all, then you will not only learn many new games, but you will also receive step-by-step instructions for each game. And if you are both old hands and have already tried a lot, then view this book as creativity training. Let yourself be surprised by how easily you can, with just the smallest variation to well-known ideas, offer your experienced player new challenges and you will soon be creating all sorts of new brain teasers and brain challenges for your dog.

Did you buy this book, because you and your dog want to have fun with activities? There are lots of reasons to play puzzle games.

It isnt a secret that intellectual stimulus and mental work are among the things that contribute to a happy dogs life. Puzzle games are a building block to enrich your dogs daily routine in a simple way. It is good to know that just a few minutes of mental exercise can make him unbelievably tired.

Irrespective of your dogs breed and individual differences, puzzle games are counted amongst those activities that enthuse all dogs without exception. On the one hand it is in the dogs nature to acquire food with skilful use of the nose or paw. On the other hand, very independent dogs or those that are supposedly difficult to motivate thrive while playing puzzle games.

Doing puzzles and problem solving perfectly match their natural disposition. There have also been experiments that show that these dogs prefer to work out how to get a piece of food out of brain teaser apparatus than to just take it!

Who would have thought it: your dog playfully solves brain teasers and as a result becomes more self-confident, even-tempered and dependable in everyday life! After every challenge he overcomes, he learns: Whatever happens I can do this!

Incidentally, playing puzzle games trains important characteristics for surviving in everyday life, like the ability to solve problems (to react intellectually and flexibly towards everyday challenges), stamina (to persevere, and not get frustrated or depressed, even if the desired result doesnt happen straight away), resilience (to endure trials, failure and even heart-stopping moments). Experts call such stimulation of physical health empowerment .

The dog brain, like the human brain, is adaptable up until old age and capable of being trained, like a muscle. Use it or lose it or Who rests, rusts is the motto here. Only those who challenge themselves mentally regularly stay mentally fit and can, as a result, gain a cognitive cushion (effectively brain mass in reserve).

According to current findings this can also delay the onset of dementia a good reason to offer your dog regular puzzle fun up until old age.

Speaking of fun, the mastered challenges will stimulate your dog and will give him many moments of happiness. And even if your four-legged friend solves the puzzles independently, these puzzle games are real communal experiences, which will bring you both even closer. You, as his trainer, are in the middle of the activity you delight in his success, are proud of him and celebrate his cleverness.

Furthermore, your dog knows exactly to whom he owes this puzzling fun you!

Brain teasers need to be something new when it comes to dogs thats quite easy and can be readily put into practice with household objects.

For us, it is simply an upside-down carton for the dog, it is a completely new mechanism!

Dont worry: you dont need to be a brain expert in order to throw yourself into, and enjoy, this puzzle fun. But you do need to understand the basic concepts of how to make these games and puzzles fresh and exciting and to keep updating them so your dog remains challenged. Brain teasers are about the new and the different that the dog has to process and solve, rather than something they already know well, which would be processed routinely.

Need an example? If you have a drivers licence, do you remember how demanding and complex it was to learn how to drive? It took peak mental performance to concentrate on how to operate the clutch or put the car into gear. After a driving lesson, the brain was fried. And what is it like now? Presumably, you now drive using the proverbial autopilot. You hardly need to think about the sequence, as everything happens automatically. It would, however, be extremely easy to make driving a car into a brainteaser again, at least for some time. For example, imagine if you had to sit at the wheel of a car designed for driving on the other side of the road.

It is similar in dogs brain teasers: brain jogging takes place, as long as your dog still enjoys doing puzzles. Once the mechanism of a game is solved, then it gives many dogs pleasure to reach the treat the easy way, through repetition of the learned trick.

But then it is no longer a brain teaser! To get the dog brain back into gear, you would have to either change something in the original game or play a new game.