The Guide to Dog Enrichment Toys for a Happier Pup

Enrichment is a term you often hear in the context of zoos; animals kept in captivity are, by necessity, restricted from the kinds of freedom they have in their natural habitats. In order to keep them happy and healthy, they're provided with different kinds of enrichment.

The same thing can apply to our household pets. As much as they're members of our families – and as much as we as humans have bred them to be more adapted to household living rather than running wild – they still have mental and physical needs.

It's our duty as pet parents to provide for those needs. The trouble is, modern society forces most of us to work 9-5s, spending a good portion of our waking hours away from the home and away from our canine companions.

That's where enrichment comes in. What can we do to provide enrichment for our pups, even when we're not around? Let's talk about it.

All About Enrichment for Dogs

Before I get into toy recommendations, I wanted to talk a little about what enrichment is in the context of dogs.

What is enrichment, specifically?

Any animal has needs. These needs come in different categories: physical, mental, and emotional.

When you examine each of these categories, you can further break them down into a bunch of different kinds of needs.

• Health needs, like disease prevention, parasite treatment, and pain management.

• Hygiene needs, like ear cleaning, tooth cleaning, and fur brushing.

• Dietary needs, including both regular food and treats.

• Exercise needs, usually focused on meeting physical fitness goals.

• Sensory needs, including stimulation for all five senses, as well as preventing undue stimulation.

• Safety needs, including environmental safety.

• Security needs, including both physical and mental security.

• Social needs, like being able to play with people or other dogs.

• Behavioral needs, which are often breed-specific, like herding or foraging behaviors.

• Mental needs, like mental stimulation, tricks, and puzzles.

Technically speaking, meeting all of these different kinds of needs is enrichment. However, these days, when you talk about enrichment, you're mostly talking about the "more than bare minimum" activities: letting your greyhounds run, letting your hunting dogs forage, and the like.

Think of it like cabin fever. Being cooped up in a small space like a home or apartment with nothing much to do will leave you bored and can lead to anxiety, neurotic behaviors, and more. It goes just as much for people as it does for dogs.

Why do dogs need enrichment toys?

Enrichment is critical to keep your pups happy and healthy. Enrichment toys are a way to help do that, either because you don't have a good way to allow a behavior and need to simulate it or because you aren't around enough to provide that enrichment yourself.

It's a sort of self-serve enrichment option, basically.

There are all manner of benefits to enrichment, but they all basically come back to one thing: keeping your dog healthy. Dogs that lack enrichment can develop behavioral issues like anxiety, destructive tendencies, neuroticism, and other issues.

Enrichment can also help extend the life of a dog. Bored and anxious dogs end up stressed out, and stress causes all sorts of problems and can make other issues – like diseases – worse.

Types of Enrichment Toys to Consider

I'm not going to give you specific toy recommendations because the market is huge. Instead, I'm going to talk about specific kinds of toys and leave it to you to decide what specific toys within that category you want to get.

Lick and Chew Toys

First up are some of the most common kinds of enrichment toys, which are toys meant to be licked at and chewed. Often, these hide a treat inside, like a dab of (xylitol-free) peanut butter, which your dog can spend time getting at. The chewing helps keep their teeth clean, the licking gives them a sensory experience, and the toy can be a source of excitement when you bring it out and give it to them.

Chew toys need to be resilient, but even the most resilient toy can eventually start to break apart under continual chewing, so make sure to inspect it each time you use it and replace it if it starts to break up so your dog doesn't eat or choke on something they shouldn't.

Snuffle Mats

Snuffle mats are sort of like very plush rugs. They're meant to mimic the experience of rooting around in a fairly deep lawn, looking for anything interesting hidden in the grass. Many different dog breeds love this kind of foraging behavior, and a snuffle mat helps you encourage it. Hide a couple of treats in the mat and let your pooch root around in it, looking for the nugget of tasty reward.

Snuffle mats need to be cleaned and, often, replaced as they start to fall apart. Fortunately, they're relatively cheap and easy to find, so you don't need to worry about their longevity too much. Just make sure they're made of a pet-safe material.

Lick Mats

Lick mats are a sort of cross between snuffle mats and lick toys. They're textured mats that you smear something like wet food or peanut butter in and let your dog go wild on trying to lick it all out. It takes time because of the texture hiding the goodies in the nooks and crevices, but it's not quite the same kind of behavior as snuffle mats.

As an added bonus, these tend to be more easily cleanable and more durable. On the other hand, if you're not proactive with cleaning them, they can get really smelly really fast.

Puzzle Toys

Puzzle toys are usually made of fairly durable plastic with little compartments you can use to hide kibble or treats. Your dog knows the treats are there – they can smell it – but they need to figure out how to get past the doors or mechanisms hiding them. It's sort of like a puzzle box for your canine child to figure out.

Simple puzzle toys are just sliding covers over compartments. More complex puzzle toys can be interlocking mechanisms that need to be moved in a certain order to access later treats. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of different designs, so you may need to go through a few before you find one that is complex enough to keep your dog entertained but not so complex that it leaves them frustrated.

Hide and Seek Toys

Hide-and-seek toys can honestly be just about anything you designate as a dog toy. Many people do things like take a dog's plushie and hide it under a pile of pillows or blankets or just hide it somewhere in the house and then ask their dog to go find it.

Dedicated hide-and-seek toys are a combination of toy and hide. For example, a big fake eggshell with a plushie chick inside. You place the egg somewhere and have your dog go find the chick. It's the same concept, just without having to risk sacrificing pillows or blankets for the cause.

These are excellent toys for dogs that love to go seek out something, especially those who are bred to be hunting dogs or have a strong drive to dig. Uncovering a hidden treasure is a pleasure they love.

Scent Toys

Scent toys are somewhat similar to hide-and-seek toys, but they work primarily on specific scents to help your pooch find them.

Usually, they come with some kind of little scent spray or scent card that provides a unique scent to track, which you hide for your dog to locate when you call for it.

Agility Toys

Some dogs can't get enough of running around and jumping, and if they could, they would have you play fetch with them for 18 hours a day. Agility toys and courses are a good way to help stimulate this drive while also adding an intellectual element to it so it can tire them out and leave them more satisfied.

I've written about setting up basic dog agility courses before, including what kind of agility elements work well and how you can lay out courses to get started. The only caveat is that you need the space to do it, but if you can get it rolling, it's a wonderful option.

Toys for You Too

There's also a category of enrichment toys that you have to take part in as well. Agility toys fall into this category, but there are also simple versions like durable balls for fetch, knotted ropes for tug-of-war, and other simple activity toys that work great, too.

On top of this, one of the best forms of enrichment is training. Teaching your dog new tricks and variations on older tricks helps to engage their brains. When those brains get working, you have a very satisfied dog at the end of it.

How to Pick a Good Enrichment Toy

Let's finish things off by talking about how to pick the right enrichment toys for your dog.

First of all, you'll never be able to just buy one or two toys and call it good. Dogs will get bored of the same toys over and over all the time, so you'll want to rotate the selection in and out. You can do this when they start losing interest, on a set schedule, or even seasonally; it all depends on your dog and your selection of toys.

Secondly, you need to pick toys that address the specific needs of your dog. Different dogs of different breeds will have different proclivities. Some won't take well to agility. Some prefer the more cognitive puzzles rather than physical activities. Some have a huge drive to hide and seek and aren't going to be interested in the more straightforward tug-of-war and other activities.

This will all change over time, too. It can depend on the breed of your dog, but also their age, their personality, and even their experience. Puzzles, in particular, tend to escalate as your pooch gets used to the simpler options and wants something more complex.

When it comes to selecting the toys specifically, there's a lot to consider.

• Make sure the toys are made of durable and non-toxic, non-dangerous materials. Expect your dog to be licking, chewing, and otherwise tearing at the toys. If it has something like a woven fabric or a filling, you need to make sure that if your dog swallows some, it won't hurt them. Long strings are a common failure point here and can cause intestinal blockages.

• Size them appropriately. Getting a toy that's too large for a small dog can be frustrating for them to use. Getting a toy that's too small for a large dog can also be frustrating in different ways, plus it can be a choking hazard.

• Don't overlap the same enrichment too much. Even if your dog is primarily food-motivated, using only food-based enrichment can get stale over time.

With so many options available, it's hard to pick anything to be the best, so expect to experiment until you find what your dog enjoys the most.

Dog Enrichment Toy FAQ

Let's answer a few questions you might have before I let you go.

I have two dogs that play with each other: do I still need enrichment toys?

Yes! If your dogs have to rely on one another for enrichment, things go wrong when one is ill or tired, and there's only so much of the right kinds of enrichment involved.

You still need to meet other needs beyond the social.

How much do enrichment toys cost?

It all depends on the kind of toy and the brand, but most enrichment toys will cost somewhere between $10 and $40.

If you're paying much more than that, ask yourself what you're getting for the money; similarly, if it's much less, wonder what they're cutting for the savings.

What if my dog isn't very food-motivated?

There are all sorts of enrichment toys that don't need food to be successful. Scent toys, hide-and-seek toys, and agility toys all fall into this group.

Every dog will have something they love; you just need to find it!

So, what are your favorite enrichment toys for your dogs? Let me know in the comments!