Creative Play in Dogs

Hands off my monkey.

Imaginative Play

When I was a child I would carry my stuffed animals one by one from my room to the couch to form a plush welcoming committee for my parents’ guests.  I recently learned from Amy McCracken, the Executive Director at Richmond Animal League, that her beloved dog Burg does a similar thing with his stuffed animals, carting each one along if he moves from room to room....and it’s a lot of stuffed animals so he has to make several trips.

Like Burg, I always wanted a thing with me.  Never human (because they are nothing but trouble) but having traces of humanity.  I would glue eyeballs onto a scrub brush and pretend it was a living being, a member of a tiny species of human-like critters who cleaned under toenails and in hard-to-reach places.

There’s a young chimp named Kakama who was observed picking up a log, cradling it like a baby, fixing up a little pretend bed and tucking it in as any good mother would do for its log baby.  This makes more sense than a scrub brush and I lay no claim to having been a brighter kid than Kakama, but the idea is the same.  Kakama and I were pretending.

Is Burg pretending as he diligently keeps track of his stuffed animals?  Or are they

A simple game of rugby is always a favorite.

simply his possessions?  Are dogs just incredibly good self-marketers and Burg knew that this particular habit would be adorable to the point of being both “awwwww!” inspiring and newsworthy?The jury is out. 

Jason G. Goldman, in his blog The Thoughtful Animal on scientificamerican.com, considered the story by Sheril Kirshenbaum, http://www.cultureofscience.com/2011/09/06/do-dogs-play-make-believe/   whose dog Happy placed a plush frog up against his food bowl so that the toy looked like it was feeding time for stuffed amphibians.  Kirshenbaum explains that “The frog continues to sit like this (20 minutes later) as Happy arranges other toys nearby. Now I admit I may be anthropomorphizing, but her behavior sure reminds me of a child playing ‘make believe’ with stuffed animals.”

Shamelessly dismembered a
Cabbage Patch doll.

The ensuing comments support the idea that some of our fuzzy babies are treating themselves to unbearably adorable flights of fancy with stuffed animals...or pieces of stuffed animals, which indicates that like humans, dogs and cats are a fickle lot at times.

Creative Play
A bull terrier with a ball obsession can find countless ways to incorporate ball 

into her everyday life.  There is no vessel that is off limits: Sink, handbag, toilet, shoe, plate of food.  It’s one thing to fetch, to catch and roll a ball, another all together to line up a shot from the second floor balcony, pulling your 

doggie toe back slowly, eyeballing the angle and poke – tennis ball driven directly into my cupped hands below.  In another version she lay in wait patiently for minutes until my wheelchair-bound mom rolled herself into the sweet-spot under the dog’s second story lookout point.  With a toy clenched between her teeth, she opens her mouth and smack, a rubber bone directly to my mother's noggin, eliciting both curses and laughter from her hapless victim.  Wheelchair or not, the dog knew that woman was hard-headed.  Or placing the ball on the floor or coffee table and pushing it with your nose in a canine mockery of ping pong or air hockey.  Catch with mouth, push with nose, score and run

gloating up the stairs, stealing the game ball and basking in your athletic prowesswhile I wipe drool off my hands in defeat.  And when no one is there to play with, the stairs will do fine.  The ball bounces down only to be quickly snatched up, and off again she runs to the top to repeat this grueling game of solo-fetch.  Each game she created on her own.  Each used a different strategy and method of propelling the ball.  My dog really is smarter than your honor student.  Meanwhile we more “advanced” beings are tucking logs and scrub brushes into makeshift beds.  To each his own.

Dreams

Kiko & Daisy, talented nappers, take their positions.

Most people agree that dogs dream.  The Pedigree.com article Do Dogs Dream? (author unnamed) suggests they dream much as we do, about their regular activities: eating, running, playing.  If they dream of Electric Sheep or Blue Turtles they spare us the details, unlike their human counterparts, who regale us with every detail of their dreams with the mistaken idea that one's existential angst shrouded in obscure metaphor is scintillating for the listener. 

Jeremy keeps busy in his dreams.

In a study done on rats, Goldman states that the rodents' brain activity while they slept and dreamed matched that of their waking brain activity.  It is presumed they were reliving their work running a maze in their dreams (much like corporate America). 

Perhaps the funny little noises your dog makes in his sleep; the pumping legs, the rolled back eyes and spastic paw movements, are his dream's physical manifestations of the fabulous day you both had together.  Such better time spent in sleep than reliving anxiety from the office or showing up naked for final exams or eating your own teeth.  

Gracie (Impawsible Pups, Richmond, VA) 
is a dog's best friend.

Imaginary Friends

To date there seems to be no hard evidence that dogs create imaginary friends. At Who Rescued Who? we hope for a day when every dog has a home, each paired with a loving family or individual.  Then there would be no need to create imaginary friends of any species, because he who has a friend in dog, has a friend indeed.  

-Kiki Nusbaumer

Links:

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130207-can-animals-imagine

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/thoughtful-animal/2011/09/07/animal-imagination-the-dog-that-pretended-to-feed-a-frog-and-other-tales/

http://www.pedigree.com/all-things-dog/article-library/do-dogs-dream.aspx