Dog Poop Is Dirty, but It Contains a Surprising Amount of Important Information

[FAM Times reporter Jennylyn Gianan] All animals, including humans, excrete feces after eating. In households with pets, picking up and cleaning away their waste is also important.

Dog poop may have almost no smell, or it may have a strong, nose-stinging odor. However, dogs do not perceive the pungent smell of dog poop the way humans do.

Dogs put their noses directly against their own feces or urine, and even other dogs' rear ends, to sniff them.

Regarding this behavior, Donald Wilson, author of “From Neurobiology to Behavior,” said dogs have a second olfactory system specially designed for strong odors such as those of feces. This organ allows dogs to gather information from odors of waste that humans cannot tolerate.

Peter Hepper, a professor in the School of Psychology at Queen's University, said, “A dog's urine and feces contain more information than simply looking at the dog.” Dogs even use waste to mark their territory. When other dogs pass through that particular area, they smell the scent of the dog that marked the territory and proceed cautiously.

Unlike dogs, humans regard the smell of dog poop as foul because it is part of a system designed to protect us from anything that could harm our bodies. For example, bacteria or germs found in dog feces register in the nose as an unpleasant smell.

Dogs also care about how their feces look. According to Avery Gilbert, author of “Why Is She Attracted to the Smell of His Skin?” and a researcher with the Association for Psychological Science, dogs sniff objects to obtain information.

Dogs sometimes eat their own feces to gather information about undigested food. According to Dr. Deborah Wells, dogs that tend to urinate after defecating socialize in this way.

This is because they rely on their sense of smell in all kinds of interactions. It may seem strange from a human perspective, but for dogs, it is simply an easy way to learn about other animals.

Jennylyn Gianan fam1@pcss.co.kr