Freya has always been a dog who needs to do things. She’s a Pharaoh Hound, a breed that I will forever maintain is one of the smartest dog breeds on the planet. This is a hill I am perfectly willing to expire on (although these days, Freya would prefer that neither one of us climb the hill in the first place). That’s also why Your Dog Is Bored cards from Sniffworthy caught my attention.
They’re a deck of 32 simple enrichment activities designed to give dogs something interesting to do without requiring a bunch of special equipment. For a dog like Freya, whose brain still expects a full daily itinerary even though her body has developed other ideas, that sounded pretty much perfect.
For most of her life, keeping her entertained wasn’t particularly complicated. We went for long walks. We hiked. She raced around the yard at approximately Mach 3 after chipmunks. She patrolled her property for squirrels, deer, bears and anything else that had the audacity to exist within her line of sight.
Then she got older. And then she developed heart disease. Suddenly, figuring out how to keep her entertained became a whole lot more complicated.
She can’t do all of those big physical activities anymore, but nobody seems to have informed her brain of that fact. She still needs things to investigate, figure out and do.
That’s where the Your Dog Is Bored cards have been especially useful. They give her things she can still do when so many of the things she loves now come with limitations.
Your Dog Is Bored is a deck of 32 easy enrichment activities designed to keep dogs mentally and physically engaged. Most activities take just 5–20 minutes and use things you already have around the house, making it easy to add more variety and stimulation to your dog’s day.
When Your Dog’s Brain Hasn’t Gotten the Memo That Her Body Is Getting Older
Freya turned 10 this year, but mentally, she hasn’t slowed down much at all. Physically? That’s another story.
After she started having pre-syncope episodes related to her heart disease, her vet gave me what sounds like very simple advice: keep her as calm as reasonably possible but still let her be a dog. Yeah, that balance is just as hard as it sounds, especially when that dog has a high prey drive.
I don’t want her spending the rest of her life wrapped in metaphorical bubble wrap. She still gets walks. She still explores the yard. She still gets to sniff things, investigate things and generally supervise everything happening on her property.
But the days when she could go on long walks every single day, especially up and down our very hilly neighborhood, are behind us.
I also can’t exactly let her spend 20 minutes racing around the yard after a chipmunk anymore. If she runs too fast, she can have an episode… or make me feel like I’m about to have one because I’m so anxious anticipating her having one. SIGH.
The problem is that taking away some of a dog’s favorite physical activities doesn’t take away her need for stimulation. In Freya’s case, it just means I have a bored Pharaoh Hound on my hands. And a bored Pharaoh Hound makes her feelings known. She mopes. She gets antsy. She barks to let me know that I’m not doing enough to entertain Her Royal Majesty.
That’s Why I Like the Your Dog Is Bored Cards
Sniffworthy’s Your Dog Is Bored cards are wonderfully simple. You get 32 physical activity cards divided among different types of enrichment, including mental activities, physical activities, safe destruction and decompression. Most activities take somewhere between about 5 and 20 minutes.
There’s no app to download, no subscription and no elaborate setup. You pull out a card and do whatever it tells you to do.
More importantly for me, the activities generally use either nothing but you and your dog or stuff you probably already have lying around the house.
And I mean an actual house. You don’t get halfway through an activity and discover that apparently everyone except you keeps an assortment of obscure craft supplies and specialty equipment in the hall closet.
Each card tells you what you’re doing, what you’ll need, approximately how long the activity takes and anything else you should know before you start. That’s it.
I really like about the fact that these are physical cards, too. I spend enough of my life staring at screens, and I don’t really need another app at this point in my life.
Mental Exercise Matters Even More Now
I always knew Freya needed mental stimulation, but it became much more obvious once we had to cut back on some of her physical activities.
She’s not just wound up because she’s not releasing enough physical energy. She’s also wound up because she’s not getting enough to think about.
Think about it this way: many high-prey-drive breeds were developed to hunt. When they’re chasing prey (in Freya’s case, Mr. Chippy Chipper), they don’t just think, “Ooh, moving object, must run after it.” They’re constantly taking in information, anticipating where their prey might go, figuring out how to head it off or drive it out of a hiding spot and adjusting what they’re doing as the situation changes.
So, by limiting Freya’s chasing to a smaller area and a shorter duration, I didn’t just cut back on her physical activity. I also took away some of the mental stimulation she was getting from it.
And that’s the part I needed to replace. I want to give her something interesting enough to occupy her brain without requiring her to physically push herself past what she can safely handle.
The cards make it easy to rotate activities instead of falling back on the same puzzle toy or game every day.
That’s particularly important with Freya because once she figures something out, that’s pretty much that. Again: Pharaoh Hound. Smartest dogs ever. My hill I will never leave.
I Also Like That This Isn’t Really a “Senior Dog” Product
Freya’s age and health are why the cards make so much sense for us right now, but they’re not specifically designed for senior dogs. Sniffworthy actually created the concept after its founders had dogs whose worlds were limited for very different reasons.
One was Mochi, a reactive American Bully whose social opportunities were limited. Before Mochi, they had Wally, an anxious English Bulldog who couldn’t handle long walks or much of the outside world. They spent years finding ways to give him a fulfilling life within those limitations.
That part of their story really resonated with me. There are a million reasons a dog might temporarily or permanently have a smaller world.
Maybe she’s getting older. Maybe she has arthritis or another health condition. Maybe she’s recovering from surgery. Maybe she’s reactive. Maybe it’s 97 degrees outside and the pavement is approximately the temperature of the sun. Or maybe it’s raining sideways and neither one of you has any interest in pretending that a three-mile walk sounds fun.
Even perfectly healthy young dogs have days when indoor enrichment makes sense. The point isn’t to replace walks, exercise, sniffing outside or all the other things dogs need. It’s to have more options.
One Important Note for Dogs with Health Conditions
Because Freya has heart disease, I don’t blindly pull a card and assume that every activity is automatically appropriate for her. Her veterinarian knows her specific condition and has given us guidance about what she can and can’t do. I use that guidance when choosing activities.
That’s important for any dog with a medical condition or physical limitation.
The deck includes physical activities as well as mental ones, and an activity that’s perfectly reasonable for one senior dog may be too strenuous for another. Even Sniffworthy notes that owners need to supervise their dogs during the activities.
So, I look at the cards as ideas, not doctor’s orders. If something seems too physically demanding for Freya, we skip it or modify it. That’s another thing I really love about these cards. The activities are super easy to modify if necessary.
What I Like Most: It Gives Me Something to Say Yes To
This is probably the biggest reason I’ve come to appreciate these cards. Having an older dog with a chronic health condition sometimes feels like an endless series of saying no.
No, we’re not going on that huge walk today. No, you can’t chase that chipmunk halfway to New Jersey. No, we’re not going to stand at the fence screaming at Murray the bear for the next 15 minutes.
Your Dog Is Bored gives me a bunch of things I can say yes to instead. Yes, let’s do this.
Yes, let’s figure this out. Yes, let’s go find something. Yes, you get to use that ridiculously clever Pharaoh Hound brain for something besides devising new ways to make me worry about you.
I can’t give Freya back everything she could do when she was younger. That’s simply part of having a senior dog, and heart disease has accelerated some of those changes for us.
But “she can’t do everything anymore” doesn’t have to turn into “she doesn’t get to do anything.” Her world may be a little smaller now. She’s still very interested in it.
Are Your Dog Is Bored Cards Worth It?
The Your Dog Is Bored deck currently costs $24, plus $5 shipping in the U.S., and includes 32 activity cards. Sniffworthy says most games require little to no special equipment and take anywhere from a few minutes to around 20 minutes.
Could you search online and find free dog enrichment ideas? Of course. You can find free ideas for almost anything. That’s not really what you’re paying for here.
You’re paying for someone else to come up with 32 ideas, organize them, explain them and put them in a format where you can literally pull one out when your dog starts wandering around the house looking like she has been tragically deprived of entertainment for several decades.
For me, the variety is the selling point.
I already know how to entertain a dog. I’ve had dogs for most of my life. What I sometimes lack, especially while I’m working and Freya has decided she’s bored right now, is a fresh idea that doesn’t require me to stop everything and invent an enrichment activity from scratch.
Pull a card. Do the thing. For a dog whose body has developed some limitations but whose brain is still demanding something interesting to do, that’s actually pretty useful.
Your Dog Is Bored is a deck of 32 easy enrichment activities designed to keep dogs mentally and physically engaged. Most activities take just 5–20 minutes and use things you already have around the house, making it easy to add more variety and stimulation to your dog’s day.
