What can cause dogs to stick their heads out every time they are in the car? This is a question that many dog owners have certainly asked themselves.
Have you ever wondered why your dog always sticks his head out the window when he’s in your car ? It suffices, in fact, to lower the window to see your 4-legged companion rush towards this opening and pass his muzzle through it.
An article published on the SciencePost site discusses this habit that our four-legged friends have. The first track mentioned is the smell of the dog. This is, of course , its most developed sense and which has earned it shine in many areas : hunting, searching for people and objects, detection of substances and signs of disease ( diabetes , breast cancer, etc.), etc. Dogs have 60 times more scent sensors than humans, which is why their flair is so powerful . In addition, said receptors send data which is processed efficiently by an equally powerful “computer”: the olfactory cortex . This is the area of the brain responsible for analyzing odors. In dogs, it is 40 times larger than in humans.
Dogs are therefore much more sensitive to odors , and car openings are real highways of olfactory information for them. The scents coming from the street, passers-by, other animals, vegetation or even garbage exert a strong attraction on the canine, which then sticks out its head to better capture them and understand what is happening outside the vehicle. .
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The article discusses another hypothesis to explain this tendency for dogs to stick their heads out of the car. They would perhaps seek to turn away from the strong odors reigning in the passenger compartment . Indeed, as explained above, they are sensitive to the slightest olfactory signals and traces that our nose is unable to perceive or to which we end up getting used to. This could be the smell of the seats (for example leather), residues of cleaning products used on the dashboard, cold tobacco , perfumes , etc.
