The Incredible Smell Of Dogs
There are many ways in which people can become animal-like. However, the ability of dogs to smell is superior to that of humans. Canines can smell up to 100,000 times better. While a dog’s brain is only one-tenth the size of a human brain, the area that controls odor is 40 times larger than in people.
The human being has an average of 5 million olfactory receptors, while these animals, depending on the breed, have between 125 and 250 billion scent glands. For example, Bloodhound dogs have 300 million odor receptors.
Puppies have heat sensors in their nose that allow them to meet their mother for as long as their eyes and ears are closed.
Dogs can also smell things from great distances. And your sense of smell can find objects that are buried several meters deep.
Throughout human history, people have taken advantage of this incredible sense of smell in dogs, whether hunting or herding. However, many animals have also been trained to detect very unusual odors, such as whale sediment.
Unlike humans, a dog can move its nostrils independently, allowing them to know which direction the odor they are detecting is coming from.
Ship dogs track the stinking treasure over a distance of over 1.6 kilometers. When they detect whale debris, they pinpoint the location by leaning their head left or right, or making the same movements with one of their ears.
A very keen sense of smell
Through their sense of smell, dogs can also detect certain diseases, such as lung or breast cancer. For that, they just need to smell people’s breath. But your olfactory acuity does not end there. By sniffing people’s urine, they can also identify prostate or bladder cancer.
Dogs can also identify certain bacteria. In 1970, a group of dogs detected a bacterium that was causing the death of millions of bees. That’s why, since that moment, beekeepers train this type of animals to find sick hives, avoiding infection in healthy swarms.
On the other hand, dogs can also smell pheromones, urine, fecal matter, skin and people’s hair. From this, a dog can tell a lot about a human, including whether they are male or female, what they eat, touch, if they are ready for fertilization, if they have recently had children or had a false pregnancy, and even what is the state of mind in which they find themselves. Even, as we mentioned, they can identify some diseases like cancer, for example.
What things can dogs smell?
Dogs can also smell polycarbonate, a key addition to DVD manufacturing. That’s why these animals are used to identify fake DVDs and fight piracy.
As we said, a dog can obviously smell humans as well. That’s why dogs are always used to search for people, especially when natural accidents such as earthquakes or tsunamis have occurred.
On the other hand, it should be noted that in armed conflicts, dogs played a very important role. During the Vietnam War, Americans used trained dogs to detect tunnels, weapons, traps and, of course, enemy soldiers as well.
To the surprise of many, it has recently been seen how some trained dogs can alert their diabetic owners when their blood sugar rises to dangerous levels. Some of them may even look for an insulin kit.
Finally, pest control services have also turned to the dogs’ powerful sense of smell, particularly to find bed bugs and other types of insects. But that is not all. Dogs can also sense when cows are ovulating. Yes, without a doubt, nature is very wise. Many farmers use this effective service that dogs offer us to detect when is the best time to breed their cows.
