Enrichment activities for your dog don’t have to cost much money. I have compiled a list of activities your dog will enjoy without breaking the bank. You can try as many or as few as you like and see which ones your dog enjoys the most.
If you don’t want to use dog treats for some of the activities, you can use some of your dog’s daily food allowance or a favorite toy.
1) Sniffari
Many areas now offer sniffari experiences for your dog. These are areas where dogs can go to sniff and explore. If your local area doesn’t have sniffari locations, don’t worry, you can improvise. It’s as simple as slowing your walk and allowing your dog to sniff to its heart’s content!
You may think that type of walk won’t tire out your dog, but by allowing it to sniff away, it’s using its brain and logging all the information its nose collects! As far as your dog is concerned, slowing down and sniffing everything it wants to is entirely satisfying.
2) Find It
Using empty toilet rolls or kitchen roll tubes with food/treats inside.
This game can use some of your dog’s daily food allowance in an empty toilet roll or kitchen roll tube. Fold one end of the tube and put a few pieces of kibble or similar into it, then fold the other end closed.
When you first introduce your dog to this, let them see you hiding it, and teach the phrase ‘find it’ when your dog knows to go and find it.
This game gives your dog a job– sniffing out the tube, then opening the tube, and finally eating the prize inside.
As your dog becomes more familiar, you can hide it better – touch surfaces with the tube to allow your dog to follow the scent.
3) Find It – using a favorite toy
Follow the same steps for Find It using the cardboard tubes and food. When your dog finds its toy – then it’s playtime!
4) Ditch the bowl
Meal times can double as enrichment time for your dog. If you have a garden/yard, you can scatter the food and allow your dog to sniff out its dinner. This may seem wrong, but dogs love to work, so let them use their noses to find their food!
5) Snuffle matt
An alternative, easy DIY method is to use a tea towel or old hand towel – drop some food into the end of the towel, then fold it over and repeat. Do this until the towel is tucked into a long strip.
Allow your dog to work out how to get into its food by unwrapping the towel. Lots of nose and brain use, which your dog will love.
6) Puzzle box
Use an empty box and empty toilet roll and/or kitchen roll tubes or crumpled scraps of paper. If you don’t have any empty tubes just use crumpled paper, or an empty egg box.
Put your empty
Amazon boxes and brown paper to use! Scatter some of your dog’s daily food allowance at the bottom of the box, stand the empty cardboard tubes up in the box, and fill in the gaps with crumpled paper (if you don’t have any tubes, then crumpled paper works just as well).
An empty egg box works too – close the lid with some kibble inside.
Then, allow your dog to sniff and work out how to get the food. Excellent brain exercise for your dog, allowing it to work for its food.
7) Hide and Seek
Play hide and seek with your dog. This can be done indoors on a rainy day or outside to add focus/recall training to daily exercise. You hide, then call your dog; when it finds you, it’s celebration time with lots of praise and fuss.
8) 5-10 Minute Training Games
Use some of your dog’s daily food allowance as motivation during some training sessions. Teaching your dog some extra commands or tricks gives your dog something new to learn and gives you some one-on-one time to strengthen your bond.
It’s a win-win for you and your dog!
9) Treat Dispenser
Using a small empty drink bottle.
Empty plastic juice/pop/soda bottles can be repurposed into a treat/kibble dispensing toy for your dog.
Wash out the empty bottle and allow it to dry thoroughly, then drop in some pieces of kibble or treats and let your dog figure out how to get them out. This will provide lots of fun for your dog.
If you’re into DIY (I’m not very good at building things ????), you can take this further by putting a hole into opposite sides of the bottle and threading through some string (or a thin piece of wood like a chopstick) so the bottle can spin on the string.
Attach the string to two posts (table legs or a doorway – you can even make a stand if you’re keen); drop in some kibble or treats, and the bottle should be able to spin, so your dog can tip the bottle to get out the treats.
10) Play Date or Buddy Walk
Arrange to meet with someone with a dog your dog gets on well with. You can walk together or meet somewhere where the dogs can have some free time to play with each other. You’ll know it’s positive play if the dogs take turns chasing and wrestling with each other.
Last Words on Enrichment For Your Dog
Most dogs are very friendly and enjoy playing with other dogs, which will be very enriching for them. It will also give you a chance to be sociable and have a chat.
There you have it, some easy alternatives to expensive toys and games, and your dog will be more than happy with them!
Enrichment is about leaning into your dog’s natural likes and letting them be dogs. Living in our world with all our human rules can be tough for them.
Finding enrichment activities doesn’t have to involve spending a small fortune, there’s lots that can be done that cost next to nothing.
I hope you and your dog enjoy them as much as me and my dog did!
Leave a Reply