While driving your car how many times have you been chased by street dogs?
Even if this did not happen to you, I am sure you must have observed this phenomenon on the road many times.
This post will unravel the mystery behind this bizarre behavior that dogs exhibit.
Last weekend my wife wanted me to drive her around to do some personal shopping. Thanks to the excellent parking facilities available in Bangalore I was forced to remain seated in the car while she went off to get her work done.
With nothing much to do I observed the following scene unfold in front of our car. There was another car parked at the curb around the corner. In came a street dog strolling along, It sniffed the front bumper of the car, and then proceeded to do what dogs normally do on 3 legs. After which it went about its usual business.
Couple of seconds later in came another dog, this one apparently was a good breed Labrador on a leash. The lab also stops at the same car, investigates the bumper and is soon also taking a pee on the bumper. The owner of the lab didn’t seem to find anything wrong in this. Apparently to him a lamppost, a tree trunk and a car are all one and the same. After the job was done, the dog and owner in tow walked away.
Another 10 minutes pass by and in strolls another street dog. Sniffing along it heads straight for the same bumper, after its bit of investigation it then proceeds to execute the same ritual. Now our good-looking car, has 3 coats of fresh Saturday evening pee sprayed all over it.
This got me thinking on what would happen next. Apparently the owner of the car would come by sooner or later, and blissfully unaware of what happened to his car he will drive home. The next day, he or whoever has the task of washing the car will come along with a bucket of water and a cloth.
The usual car washing ritual involves dipping the cloth in the water and wiping it on the car, after which the cloth will go back into the bucket to get soaked once more and then the process would get repeated until the entire car is cleaned.
To the untrained eye washing is what appears to be done, but in reality the person cleaning the car would be transferring the 3 different specimens of pee, uniformly all over the car. By the time the washing is complete, to a human being the car would appear to be clean. But for a dog it’s an entirely different story. Dogs have scent glands that are 1,000 times more powerful than man’s. So to a dog this car would be like a pickled block on wheels marinated in dogs pee.
The next time you drive by in one such car, You will find some dogs bark and chase you. Now why is this ?
It is because Dogs are territorial animals and will detect the smell from your car as that of 3 other intruder dogs entering their territory. Instinct tells them that they need to chase these dogs away, and this is why they chase your car manically barking.
Now that the blocks have fallen in place you now know why dogs chase cars. So the next time you find 3 - 4 dogs barking and chasing your car. Well buddy you know what your car must smell like !!!
For a dog You are perhaps sitting in a Sulabh complex on wheels.
