If your pup has the habit of barking in front of their food bowl or circling you when it’s getting close to their dinner time, you may wonder whether they have a sense of time. The short answer is yes, they do.
Studies show they may experience it at different speeds. Dogs perceive time through changes in their body, observation, and smell.
Though they may not know “5 p.m.,” or “dinner,” they may know exactly what time it is by the feeling of their empty stomach.
Ever wonder how your dog always knows when it’s dinner time? Or how they’re waiting at the door minutes before you usually arrive home? I’ve been fascinated by this for years, especially after watching my neighbor’s dog, Max, who somehow knows exactly when his owner’s car will pull into the driveway – like clockwork!
It’s not just coincidence or good hearing Dogs have an incredible ability to tell time using their remarkable sense of smell Let’s dive into this fascinating canine superpower that scientists are just beginning to understand.
The Incredible Canine Nose: A Time Machine in Disguise
Dogs have an absolutely mind-blowing sense of smell. While humans make do with about 5 million smell receptors, dogs boast more than 200 million This gives them an advantage we can barely comprehend – they experience the world primarily through scent rather than sight
Alexandra Horowitz, who founded Barnard College’s Dog Cognition Lab and wrote the book “Being a Dog,” has studied this phenomenon extensively. According to her research, dogs don’t just use smell to identify things – they actually use it to perceive the passage of time itself!
How Does Scent Tell Time? The Science Behind It
So how exactly do dogs smell time? It’s pretty cool when you understand the science:
1. Scent Intensity Tracks Time
When you leave your house, your scent is strongest As hours pass, your scent gradually weakens Dogs can track this decline precisely, associating specific scent strengths with specific times.
As Horowitz explains:
“Smells in a room change as the day goes on. Hot air rises, and it usually rises in currents along the walls and will rise to the ceiling and go kind of to the center of the room and drop. If we were able to visualize the movement of air through the day, what we’re really visualizing is the movement of odor through the day.”
2. The Physics of Smell
Odors actually contain information about past, present and future:
- Past: Weak scents low to the ground might indicate someone who passed by earlier
- Present: Current scent distributions tell what’s happening now
- Future: Strengthening scents carried on breezes can alert dogs to who’s coming around the corner
In a way, dogs understand a fundamental aspect of physics – the relationship between time and space – through their sense of smell!
The Donut Story: A Real-Life Example
One of my favorite real-life examples comes from an NPR story about a dog named Donut. This family dog would spend most days sleeping on the living room rug while the children were at school. But every single day, without fail, Donut would get up, go to the back porch, and sit by the window just before the school bus arrived with the kids.
The family was baffled – how could Donut tell time so precisely?
Horowitz explained that Donut likely learned to associate a specific level of the children’s scent in the house with their imminent return. Every morning, the kids would leave behind their unique smell signature. Throughout the day, those odors would gradually diminish at a predictable rate. When the scent reached a certain threshold of faintness, Donut knew the bus was about to arrive!
Beyond Smell: A Dog’s Complete Time Sense
While their incredible smell is the star of the show, dogs actually use multiple methods to track time:
Circadian Rhythms
Just like us, dogs have internal biological clocks that regulate sleep, hunger, and activity levels. Their bodies naturally respond to the 24-hour cycle.
Physical Sensations
Dogs pay attention to their own bodies – hunger pangs, full bladders, and energy levels all give them clues about the time of day.
Environmental Cues
They notice changing light levels, sounds in the neighborhood, and other patterns that repeat daily.
Memory and Association
Dogs remember sequences of events and can anticipate what comes next (like walks after breakfast).
But it’s their sense of smell that gives them the most precise time-telling ability!
The Time Warp: How Dogs Experience Time Differently
Interestingly, dogs don’t just have different methods for tracking time – they actually experience time at a different rate than we do. Research suggests that animals perceive time at speeds related to their metabolism.
Dogs have higher metabolisms than humans, which means they may experience time more slowly. What feels like 60 minutes to us might feel like about 75 minutes to a dog!
This might explain why they’re so excited when we return after brief absences – to them, it felt longer!
The Practical Side: How This Affects Your Dog
Understanding how your dog perceives time can help you be a better pet parent:
- Consistent schedules help your dog predict their day through scent patterns
- “Smell walks” where you let your dog sniff freely are incredibly enriching – it’s how they “see” the world
- Separation anxiety might be worse for dogs who can’t track your scent accurately
- Patience when training – they experience time differently than you do
Can Humans Smell Time Too?
While nowhere near as sophisticated as dogs, humans do use smell to track time in simple ways:
- Sniffing milk to check if it’s gone bad
- Noticing when someone wearing cologne was recently in an elevator
- Smelling when food is beginning to spoil
But our reliance on visual cues and actual timepieces means we’ve lost touch with this more primal way of experiencing time.
Try This At Home: A Simple Experiment
Want to see your dog’s time-telling ability in action? Try this experiment:
- Establish a consistent daily schedule for about a week
- Watch what time your dog starts anticipating your usual activities (getting ready for walks, meal times, etc.)
- Then change ONE aspect of your routine and see if they notice
- Document when they start showing anticipatory behaviors
I tried this with my dog Bailey last month, and she started getting excited for walks about 5 minutes before our usual time, even when I hadn’t made any obvious moves toward her leash!
Final Thoughts: Appreciating Canine Superpowers
Our dogs live in a world dominated by scent, where time itself has a smell. It’s a completely different way of experiencing reality than our vision-centric world.
When your dog knows it’s dinner time or anticipates your arrival home, they’re not just being smart – they’re demonstrating an ancient and sophisticated ability to navigate time through smell.
So next time you catch your pup seemingly telling time, remember – they’re not looking at a watch. They’re smelling the minutes tick by!
What’s your experience with your dog’s time-telling abilities? Have you noticed them anticipating events with uncanny accuracy? I’d love to hear your stories in the comments!
Time to Dogs and Humans
We understand there are many similarities and differences in which humans and dogs experience time.
Dogs have a natural awareness of time, while humans have traded natural awareness for clocks and timers.
Because dogs are so in tune with our activities, pet parents can affect their dog’s sense of time by changing their schedule.
Many dogs can’t sleep until their humans settle. Dogs may wait longer for breakfast on certain days, or have their weekday walk swapped for a car ride to the dog park.
Though most dogs eventually adjust to certain changes, if you have a dog that struggles with anxiety, constant disruptions in schedule and routine can be difficult for them and result in additional problems.
How long does one hour feel to dogs?
Time perception is being looked at more closely.
As mentioned previously, animals perceive time at different speeds—meaning they experience a sequence of events at different rates based on their metabolism.
Dogs have a higher metabolism than humans, and thus experience time more slowly. Our 60 minutes translates to about 75 minutes for them.
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Erika Lessa, CBST, CDBT, CDBC, CPDT-KA, Fear-Free Certified
Can dogs tell the time? | Inside the Animal Mind – BBC
FAQ
Do dogs use odors to tell time?
Johnson explains that dogs use odors to tell time, referencing the book “Being A Dog: Following The Dog Into A World Of Smell” by cognitive scientist and canine researcher Alexandra Harowitz. “Horowitz believes that a dog’s day is marked by tenuous shifts of smell in their environments,” Johnson said.
How do dogs tell time?
Johnson breaks down how your dog’s sense of smell, circadian rhythm and brain help him tell time. Johnson explains that dogs use odors to tell time, referencing the book “Being A Dog: Following The Dog Into A World Of Smell” by cognitive scientist and canine researcher Alexandra Harowitz.
Do dogs have a sense of smell?
Physiological (functioning of the body) changes in the body tell a dog when it is time to wake up, sleep, eat, go to the bathroom, and exercise. It’s a known fact that dogs have an impressive sense of smell. In Alexandra Horowitz’s book, ” Being A Dog,” she discusses a dog’s ability to smell the passage of time by the intensity of the scent.
How does a dog know when a day is a good time?
Horowitz believes dogs are actually able to use their keen sense of smell to determine what time of day it is: Smells in a room change as the day goes on. Hot air rises, and it usually rises in currents along the walls and will rise to the ceiling and go kind of to the center of the room and drop.
Do dogs tell time with their noses?
“Horowitz believes that a dog’s day is marked by tenuous shifts of smell in their environments,” Johnson said. “Dogs ‘tell time’ with their noses by determining new or recent smells and differentiating them between older smells that were laid much earlier in the day or even week.”
Do dogs sense the time of day?
Many observant owners can confirm that their pets seem to sense when their owner is about to arrive home, for instance, or when it’s time for bed. Horowitz believes dogs are actually able to use their keen sense of smell to determine what time of day it is: Smells in a room change as the day goes on.
How long does 1 hour feel to a dog?
What is 10 minutes of sniffing for dogs equivalent to?
How much time is 1 hour in dog time?