Arthur's Sometimes Amazing Nose

Hello Everyone,

Dogs have a great sense of smell. It's why they poke their nose into everything, and it's a big part of how they perceive the world. Or so I've been told. I've heard various experts even say that the difference in quantity (how much better they smell than we do) is such that it becomes a difference in quality (how they think about time, how they interact, what information they value). They are on the level of being able to detect parts per trillion. Apparently.

But they are not infallible. All that information still gets sent to their doggy brains, which like ours, aren't always running at 100%. On a walk one evening this week, I saw Arthur's amazing nose, and somewhat inattentive mind, in action. In the first instance, we stopped in front of a house around the corner from us and Arthur spent a little while sniffing the grass on their small front lawn. It was dark out and the grass was overgrown, but from my vantage point, I could see what Arthur had apparently failed to detect. Sitting not 3 feet from his nose was a neighbourhood cat, crouched in the grass, hoping to avoid being seen.

Arthur isn't one to chase cats usually. They're not squirrels, but he's normally at least eager to check them out. But here, he completely missed that he was close to one while he was engrossed in sniffing the grass.

Later, as we passed the alley behind my apartment block, Arthur stopped dead in his tracks and focused on the big trash bins there. There wasn't a sound or a movement I could detect, but sure enough, after about a minute of standing stock still, a raccoon peeked out from the trash bin and scrambled out onto the top of the thing. Arthur had picked out his scent from about 30 feet away, just by walking by the alley, despite all the conflicting smells that come from a big trash bin in the summer.

Have you ever searched for something for awhile, or looked at a familiar scene, only to find some hidden element you didn't see was right there in front of you? I suspect that Arthur's nose works in the same way. He must have been able to smell that cat, he just wasn't paying attention.

I guess it's a good thing that we perceive the world a bit differently. Because man, if we had the same inattentiveness, we'd be in trouble.

wes

#Arthur #Dogs