Agreed; I always let my cat smell things that I’m holding/working on because they clearly are interested in what their human is doing. That way he can get a better idea of what’s going on and feel like he’s helping.
Ole time in my life, I lived in a house with cats. I got into the habit of showing whatever I was holding to them when they came to check if I had food. They’d sniff the thing, decide it’s not edible and go back to more interesting cat business.
Then I lived in a house with dogs and had to unlearn that because if you show something to a dog, they’ll probably just take it to chew whether it smells edible or not.
I see it as enrichment, like when they give bears at the zoo something to smell to entertain them. Makes my cat happy at least just to smell stuff
Agreed; I always let my cat smell things that I’m holding/working on because they clearly are interested in what their human is doing. That way he can get a better idea of what’s going on and feel like he’s helping.
It goes both ways too:
Ole time in my life, I lived in a house with cats. I got into the habit of showing whatever I was holding to them when they came to check if I had food. They’d sniff the thing, decide it’s not edible and go back to more interesting cat business.
Then I lived in a house with dogs and had to unlearn that because if you show something to a dog, they’ll probably just take it to chew whether it smells edible or not.
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