Easy & Cheap DIY Scent Detection Toy For Your Dog!

For less than a couple of Euros and within 10 minutes, I created a fun (dare I say cute) toy for Inka, the lovely Labradoodle-mix I share my life with. Scent detection is something I’ve wanted to do together with Inka for a while now. My criteria for this toy? Something small, light, soft (to squeeze into small spaces), “scent …

Why Do We Live With Animals?

Why do we live with animals? How would we change our behaviours and practices if we answered that questions honestly? Over ten years ago, at a large seminar for individuals and their horse companions, a world-famous horseman asked just that: Why do you have horses? Why do you ride them and what drew you to that concept in the first …

Your mental cinema

In Germany, people might talk about their “Kopfkino”. When roughly translated, this means “mental cinema”. We all have a mental cinema playing in our minds – the films are our personal experiences and expectations of how situations will unfold. Most of us don’t actively decide what we play in our mental cinema and this can have detrimental effect on how we …

Exercising my dog?

(Photo by Alessio Albi) In the world of dog-owners, two continents have formed: those who push their dogs to physical exhaustion daily and those who, well, don’t do that. There is an ocean, or a middle-road between these two extremes which I’d like to address with this post. Some research states that dogs require around 20 hours of sleep per day. …

Wolves as Spirit Guides: Reality or Romanticism?

Here is another paper which I wrote for my Masters in Anthrozoology and thought you guys might find interesting. Tell me what your thoughts are on this topic in the comments!   How does a woman’s experience finding psychological well-being from a wolf (Canis lupus) spirit guide contrast to that of a woman following a similarly romanticised quest with a …

Is musicality a uniquely human trait?

Here is another paper which I wrote for my Masters in Anthrozoology and thought you guys might find interesting. Tell me what your thoughts are on this topic in the comments!   The nature-culture dichotomy has been partly fueled by the belief that humans are unique in their musicality. A simple definition of musicality can be difficult to agree upon, …

Are dogs persons? Personhood through the human lens…

Here is one of the papers I submitted for my Masters in Anthrozoology which I wanted to share with you all: Humans often accept dogs (canis lupus familiaris) as being somewhat human-like and part of the family (Shir-Vertesh, 2012; Blouin, 2013; Irvine, 2004b; Albert and Bulcroft, 1988; Irvine, 2004a; Irvine, 2004b; Beck and Katcher, 1996; Cain, 1985; Hickrod and Schmitt, …