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The Science Pawdcast
The Science Pawdcast breaks down the latest science happening in the human world AND the pet world.
Each episode will also bring you a guest to enthral you with their area of knowledge.
You'll learn, be captivated, and laugh along with host Jason Zackowski.
Pets and Science, it's the pawfect mix.
You'll also get episodes of PetChat which are the live shows from social audio.
PetChat is a live community gathering updates about the animals in our life, but also the animals in the wonderful community that supports us!
Heart and Hope.
Science and Shenanigans.
The Science Pawdcast
Season 5 Episode 31: Lullabies for Pain, Pets vs Dementia, and Lendy Beatty on Scent Infused Toys!
Promising you a journey through the fascinating world of science and pet ownership, we've got an episode jam-packed with intriguing insights. You're in for a ride as we unravel how music can soothe pain in newborns and why having a dog could be your shield against dementia. We lean on research from Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center and the University of Michigan's Health and Retirement Study to make sense of these remarkable connections between music, pets, and human health.
In this episode, we're thrilled to have Lendy Beatty from Playology join us for a chat. Lendy offers us a sneak peek into the world of scent-infused dog toys and the science behind their creation. Playology's toys are not just play things but cognitive stimulators for dogs. We discuss ongoing research at Texas Tech Animal Behavior Department that's exploring if different senses influence playtime duration. Prepare for some chuckles as we share funny pet stories and delve into the curiously engaging phenomenon of dogs sniffing separately with each nostril.
As a grand finale, we disclose our exciting plans for the upcoming Comic-Con event. From choosing costumes for our beloved dogs, Bunsen and Beaker, to ensuring their comfort and safety, we've got it all covered. We also share an anecdote about a veterinary visit for Beaker and our preparations for the event. So, pull up a chair, grab your lab coat and safety glasses, and prepare for an entertaining and enlightening journey through the Science Podcast. Let's learn, laugh, and love the world of science and pets together!
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Hello science enthusiasts. My name is Jason Zekowski. I'm a high school chemistry teacher and a science communicator, but I'm also the dog dad of Bunsen and Beaker, the science dogs on social media. If you love science and you love pets, you've come to the right place. Put on your lab coat, put on your safety glasses and hold onto your tail. This is the Science Podcast.
Speaker 2:Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Science Podcast. We hope you're happy and healthy out there. Oh boy, it's an exciting week. All of the costumes are ready to go for Saturday and Sunday. It's humans only. On Saturday, at the Edmonton Comic Con, we're getting away, chris and I as a couple, to go be Mando's all day, and then Bunsen and Beaker are special guests on Sunday at the Edmonton Comic Con at 11. So I'm excited to see how it goes. We'll take as many pictures and photos as we can. It's usually so busy we forget to do it all. But yeah, we're very excited. We're very excited for this week. Okay, well, what's on the Science Podcast this week?
Speaker 2:In science news, we're going to talk about how some tunes of music may have alleviated pains in newborns, like little babies awe. And in pet science, an American study looked at dog ownership and dementia and the results are promising. We have a really unique guest and ask an expert. It's Lendi Beatty, who is basically in charge of dog toys for Playology. We're going to get into the science of how they make those toys so cool. The joke this week comes from the Bunsen and Beaker Activity Book. The PawPak Activity Book just came in. It's adorable. There's a bunch of dog jokes in our Activity Book for Kids and here's one of them. What did the dog say to the tree Bark? And it's actually better if you go wof, wof, wof, wof, wof, wof. All right, let's get on with it. There's no time like science time. This week science news we are going to talk about a really adorable study that comes from Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center in the Bronx and it has to do with when newborns have to get their shots or their heel pricks.
Speaker 2:It's painful. Maybe it's like the first pain they've really experienced outside of mum. I guess the birthing situation for them is kind of traumatic perhaps, and I remember right after Adam was born he's a little baby and he was crying. He was so sad and I wanted to like comfort him and the doctor was like no, no, no, he has to cry and I was like, oh my god, he's just. I just wanted to touch the baby, I just wanted to comfort him. So it's kind of cool that we have some people looking into infant pain. Now.
Speaker 2:The catchy headline is they use different ways to help alleviate pain, and one of the ways that shows promise is music. For a while in infant care, it was thought that newborns didn't experience pain at all. Crying was just like their only way of communicating and they didn't actually feel pain. Well, that was completely debunked through a series of like nerve tests and just basic human physiology, as we understood how the nerve to pain signals worked. Infants can be more sensitive to pain than adults. So some of the things that happens to babies, like right away with newborns, are like heal pricks and, of course, their vaccinations, and that causes pain. What doctors and nurses in the past have prescribed to help reduce pain is like skin contact skin to skin contact, like if the baby's crying, skin to skin, breastfeeding and also sugar solutions. So the team at Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center wanted to look at other ways they could help alleviate newborn pain. So the sugar solution was combined with other non-pharmological approaches, like things that weren't drugs, and one of the non-pharmological approaches was music, because it's basically free to implement, it's super cheap.
Speaker 2:The team took a hundred infants that were born at Lincoln into a music and no music group. Guess which music they used. They used lullabies and specifically the lullaby group got the song Deep Sleep from bedtime Mozart. So I don't get a copyright strike, I'm just gonna play a few seconds of it. Okay, beautiful, right, really pretty. And they began playing 20 minutes before any of the pain and the pain that the babies were gonna experience was the heel prick. They got the heel prick and then the music continued for five minutes after.
Speaker 2:How do you assess how much pain a baby's in? I didn't know this, but there's a neonatal infant pain scale. They look at the babies' faces, they look at if they're crying, how fast and shallow or how fast and hard they're breathing, and the pain scale is measured from zero to seven, with seven being the highest. Sadly, during the heel prick, the, the no music group had an average pain scale of almost seven, but the infants with the classical music playing had a score below five. Now, quite quickly, the heel prick group had its pain scale range from seven quite a bit lower, but the lullaby group had a continued lower score as time went on. The research team was quick to point out that it's really important to understand neonatal pain because pain is a huge indicator for outcomes in healthcare and of course you don't necessarily want to give babies a pain killer. But this music is free.
Speaker 2:I think it's cute to that even a little bit of effort, like playing a lullaby, can help lessen the pain in the tiniest and most precious of our humans. That's science news for this week. This week in pet science we're gonna look at a study in the United States that literally just came out that found a really promising connection between pet ownership and a protective effect against dementia. One of the things that I've heard from folks and like I have, colleagues and their parents are older or their parents have passed on is some people's parents get Alzheimer's or dementia and how tough it is because, while they ultimately succumb to Alzheimer's or dementia, one of the things I've heard is you lose your parent twice. You lose them to the disease and then you lose them when they die and that's gotta be really tough Without getting too much into a downer. That kind of happened to my mom If you've been following the science podcast. Last summer she got a freak brain infection. We still don't know where it came from. It happened rapidly, it was super severe and caused massive brain damage. So before, without getting into too many details, I did see my mom slip away. She wasn't my mom anymore, the mom that I knew, and that was really tough for my family and my dad. So I think these studies that look at a way to protect that are probably near and dear to the hearts of folks that are listening that have said somebody go through something like that. The team that did this study is from the Department of Sociology and Criminology and Law at the University of Florida in Gainesville. Lead department head, jennifer Applebaum was the one that kind of championed the cause here.
Speaker 2:Dementia has many factors as to why it occurs and folks that are older, and every year after 65 the chances that you would get dementia rapidly increase. Current research shows that approximately 33% of dementia cases aren't inevitable. They're controlled by physical inactivity, being extremely isolated, cardiovascular disease, stress and other other like lifestyle or life situations. So well, the other percentages we don't know if we can help it. Perhaps it is an inevitable consequence of getting older. There is a certain percentage that by changing what you're doing now as a young person and as you age, you could potentially word off dementia.
Speaker 2:And this is where dog ownership comes into play. This team wanted to know, because socialized isolation is linked to dementia. They wanted to know if having a pet, specifically a dog, had a protective effect. We've talked about this before, but these studies have been from Europe. It's really interesting that this one comes from North America. The data was gathered from the University of Michigan's Health and Retirement Study, and this study, I guess, tracks a huge group of United States adults aged 50 or older so sorry, canadians and Mexicans and South Americans. This is just data from the United States.
Speaker 2:They're a subset of all of these people, close to 1,400 people and their cognitive abilities were tested every two years over six years. They tested how their number sense was like counting backwards and subtracting. I am not good at counting backwards. I am not good at counting period and verbal memory tasks. So you are told a short phrase and then you have to wait and then you have to explain it, or you're told something and then a couple days from now you have to regurgitate it. You're testing your memory, both short and a bit longer.
Speaker 2:One thing they found was prescribing a dog for very short-term interactions provided no protection whatsoever. So this would be like somebody's 65 and a therapy dog comes to say hello to them. They found that that did not help their cognitive abilities at all, but extended long-term day-to-day interactions with a pet dog over the entire six years appeared to be pretty important for cognitive benefits. The folks who are over 65 that did have this continuous interaction with dogs showed higher cognitive scores compared to the non-dog owners or those who had interactions with dogs that were very short-term. The folks who had dogs scored the best on verbal memory tests.
Speaker 2:One of the speculations in the study is when you interact with a dog by petting it, oxytocin, which is known as the love hormone, is released. So that oxytocin love hormone in some other studies is also associated with social cognition and memory encoding and that could ward off the onset of dementia or alter your life completely. Where it does not affect you, there may be other things in your late age that do. While they can't make a conclusion on why, the conclusion is that there's a lot of evidence to suggest that if you have a long-term dog, it protects you against cognitive decline. Pretty cool, hey. Why can't I find my keys. I've got two dogs and I can't find my keys some mornings. Psy, well, you know what. That's PetScience for this week.
Speaker 2:Hey everybody, before we get to the interview section, here's a couple ways you can help the Science Podcast out. Number one if you're on any place that rates podcasts, give us a great rating. Tell your friends and share it with people who love science and pets, like teachers. Number two think about signing up as a member of the Paw Pack. It allows you to connect with people who love our show and it's a way to keep the show free. Number three check out our merch store. We have the Bunsen Stuffie 2.0. There's still some beaker stuffies left that they're adorable as well Warm, cuddly clothes and adorable drinkware. The link is in the show notes.
Speaker 2:Now on to the interview. It is time for Ask an Expert on the Science Podcast, and I have Lendi Beatty, playology's Chief Innovation Officer, with me today. That is a cool title, lendi. Hello, hi, jason. How are you? I am amazing. I hope that one time in my life I have some acronyms like Chief Innovation Officer sooner or later. I am very excited to talk to you. Where are you in the world? Where are you calling?
Speaker 3:into the show from. We are based in Nashville, Tennessee.
Speaker 2:Is that home to you? Have you had to move around, oh?
Speaker 3:so good question. Yeah, we actually just moved here in 2021, so three years ago from Los Angeles, California. Today, I'm real happy we live here and not there.
Speaker 2:Oh right, because those of you who are listening, we're recording this live. In August they're having a hurra quake. If I'm yes, which is a quake or a quake-a-cane, Whatever you want to say it.
Speaker 3:I like quake-a-cane.
Speaker 2:Have you been to see the sights in Nashville? I hear it's quite the touristy place. I interviewed another scientist from Nashville and they're like, yeah, if you go out, there are so many bachelorette parties happening at random times.
Speaker 3:Well, it is the bachelorette capital of the world. It literally is the most desirable city to come to if you are having a bachelorette party. Yes, there are a lot of bachelorettes and they're all down on Broadway going to all the honky-tonks. But it's a great little city, I have to tell you. It's got a really vibrant music scene. Obviously it is the home of country music. We have Dolly Parton here. Nice, you can't complain about that. It's a great combination of artsy music, foodie scene with real Southern hospitality.
Speaker 2:I love it, I love it yeah, I mean it's a great thing that people talk about. It's on my list of places to visit, so I guess you're just adding more reasons to go Maybe not the bachelorette part, but some of the other reasons.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if you're interested in peddling a tractor and drinking beer out of a keg at the same time, that might be your jam.
Speaker 2:Okay, I have to run that by my wife. Lendi, you're here to talk about playology and I'll let you maybe describe it. What is playology?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so basically playology is we are an innovative provider of what I want to say, like our engaging dog toys, and basically what we do is we fuse the science of scent along with the power of play to create the best possible, most engaging toys for dogs.
Speaker 2:Okay, how were you just? Were you playing with a dog one day and you're like, hmm, what is the thing, how did it come about?
Speaker 3:Yeah, really good question. So my husband and I are pet parents and we have big dogs. I know you have a big dog, we have Lee and Burgers who are there. We had one that was 200 pounds. They usually run around 100, 140 pounds and we had one in particular that really took a liking to drywall and yeah, and he would just start eating holes in the walls.
Speaker 3:So we had brought many dog toys home for the dogs that we've had and I'm sure that every pet parent can relate there was like the graveyard of dog toys. It was the dog toys that you brought home that they didn't care about at all, or there was the toys that you would bring home and they would tear it apart in two seconds. So we were looking for a better toy so that we could give our dog something to stop the destructive behavior. And we just kind of were walking down the dog toy aisle and looked around and just felt like you know what everything in this aisle looks like. It was designed for what people would want out of a dog toy and not really what a dog would want out of a dog toy, and there were like cute squirrels and pigs and bags of chips that had funny, quirky, punny sayings and we just started looking at that and thinking I don't think the dog cares what anything looks like.
Speaker 3:So we started thinking about, ok, what's important to a dog? And we ended up partnering with some universities and kind of came to this realization that dogs experience the world through their noses. They have an incredible sense of smell that's way more sensitive than humans and that's really how they experience the world. And an interesting smell in the backyard can be a five minute activity for a dog. So we just sort of thought, ok, there's got to be something here. What if we were to somehow incorporate scent into toys and use that as a means of engagement?
Speaker 2:So, Wendy, these are the scented toys that I believe I did some background on.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, yeah. So all the toys are embedded with scent. There's a lot of toys where you stuff them with treats as a means of engagement, but that just adds unnecessary calories. So we loved this idea of being able to embed the toys with scent and that that would be what would keep dogs engaged.
Speaker 2:I hear you. You know I love the. We have a BarkBox subscription. I hopefully that doesn't make people upset with us and BarkBox the toys that we get are. I feel sometimes it's more for the pet parents. I hear you there because they are cute, they're punny. I don't. I, you know I'm a scientist but I'm. I could probably make a conclusion that dogs don't get the puns Like it's not safe to say.
Speaker 2:Probably right. So I do hear you. So I have a couple of follow-up questions. Yeah, First off, like what do your toys look like? Are they rugged? Are they soft? Did they run the gambit Like what's?
Speaker 3:the point. Yeah, so they. So they run the gambit. So we started off with the scent, right? So we said, okay, we want to make these toys scented, we want them to be super engaging. Okay, well then, what do we do with the toys themselves?
Speaker 3:It was important to us that they were durable because, like I said, I we had our own graveyard of toys that were destroyed in two seconds. So we wanted them to be durable, and we also wanted to have a lot of different peace types to appeal to a lot of different types of dogs. Right, dogs are super unique. They're just like people are, and a lot of the reasons that they play is based on kind of their predatory instincts, you know. So, like when you throw a ball or a stick and they chase it, you're basically triggering their natural predatory desire to taste things that move. So we wanted to ensure that we had all different kinds of toys in the assortment that appealed to different types of dogs, different types of play and different sizes of dogs.
Speaker 3:So we have everything from. We have all natural rubber toys that are most durable and we have ones that have the crazy high, squeaky noise We've got. We do have some plush toys, but we made them incredibly durable. We added a layer of what we call bite-proof material and it's made from ultra high molecular weight polyethylene, which is one of the strongest man-made fibers, and we, you know. So everything is kind of all about durability, but making sure that there's still like really fun engaging play, that's part of it. So we've got, you know, our tennis balls, or squeaky tennis balls. They're made from all natural rubber. They're so much better for dogs than tennis balls If you talk to any veteran Arian yeah, regular tennis balls that if you play with dogs outside and you use those felt tennis balls, it's like sand. You know they get real dirty. And when your dogs chew on them it's like sandpaper on the back of their teeth. It's just terrible for them.
Speaker 2:And occasionally they swallow them if they're a big enough dog. I've seen that, but I guess that could happen with any toy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean, which is why you need to get, which is why we have multiple sizes of our toys and we also try to give some weight ranging on weight ranges on the packaging. So, people, you know. So we help pet parents make a decision because, I said, a lot of the feedback we got was, you know, pet parents would go into the toy aisle and it's overwhelming.
Speaker 2:And it is. It's like a kid going into toys or us.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and they don't know what they don't know and they don't know the right decisions to make. And so, you know, we heard that we wanted to deliver as much education as possible on the packaging. So we have sizing on the packaging so people know what's the appropriate size to get for their dog. We also have like a durability rating so they know if they've got a power chewer, maybe this toy is not great for them. So we really tried to help guide that purchase because, you know, at the end of the day, somebody's going into a store and they want to buy a toy because they want to take it home and they want their dog to play with it and they want them to be happy with it and that gives, you know, a pet parent, great satisfaction. So, you know, I just want to make sure we're giving them an easy way to make the right choice to bring home a toy that their dog's going to want to play with.
Speaker 2:There is when a dog is so happy with the toy. It's like you live vicariously through their joy. Totally Our burner Bunsen. He doesn't play with toys, except for one specific type of toy, and it makes a honking like a grunting sound.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:And it is like we just have to stop and watch him play with this toy, because he has so much joy. He like, he like, smashes it with his nose, like it's so adorable when our golden is a destroyer of things, so she'll just rip toys apart.
Speaker 3:But I assume she likes to play fetch right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, especially aquatic stuff. Like if she'll throw anything into the water she'll like happily go get it and bring it back to you for sure.
Speaker 3:A million times.
Speaker 2:A million times yeah, until it's like dangerous. I think we're going to drown beaker. She's like I can do it one more time.
Speaker 3:I've got one more in me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, can I ask you a question about the scent that goes into the toys? Yeah, what?
Speaker 1:is it? How do we?
Speaker 3:do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, is that or is that secret? Like no, no.
Speaker 3:Black and white. Well, I mean, I won't give you the ingredients, but it's definitely not secret, no, so this was a really interesting process. So we went through this process where we had the aha moment. We're like, well, we want to put scent in the toys. And then we were like, ok, well, how the heck are we going to do it? And we didn't want to just I don't know, like dip the toy in the scent because we felt like it's going to wear off.
Speaker 3:But if the dog likes it and chews on it and plays with it, it's not going to last very long. So we actually partnered with Clemson School of Material Design and we were working with them on what was a way that we could embed the scent into the toys and we kind of used the scientific method of scratch and sniff stickers. So basically everything is micro-encapsulated. So we work with an actual flavor provider here in the United States. They make human consumable flavorings and we worked with them to micro-encapsulate that flavoring, that smell, into a gelatin cap. And then we take that micro-encapsulated scent which is in an emulsion and we mix it into the raw material prior to the manufacturing process. So it's literally baked and embedded into all the toys, and so when your dog chews the toy, it bursts those scent bubbles and that's what keeps them engaged. So the more they play with the toy, the more they stay engaged, the more those scent bubbles they burst.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness, that is so cool. Yeah, what are some of the scents? I know you can't tell you that chemicals, but yeah, so we have. Are they what I would think a dog would like? Or did you do testing with dogs to see what dogs like?
Speaker 3:So yes, we did both. We did do testing. So we actually did a study with Purdue School of Veterinary Medicine. They did a two-phase study with us. The first phase was we wanted to make sure that this hypothesis that dogs would be engaged longer with scented toys was actually accurate. So the first phase of the study they took and the reason why we went this method is we used kenneled dogs and it was because we were able to control the environment and we were also able to have scientists and grad students actually measure playability versus trying to send these home with pet parents who have a lot of other things going on. It would be very difficult for them to try and do this in a home environment.
Speaker 3:So we used 12 kenneled dogs and they were offered a rotation of six toys in total three different scented toys of ours and then three toys that were unscented and they measured the duration of interaction with the toys and at the end of the study they found that out of the 12 dogs, 10 of them spent more time interacting with the scented toys versus the unscented toys. And then the second phase was they wanted to see if there was a preference by each dog for a different scent. So we had five different scents. They were peanut butter, chicken, bacon, sweet potato and cheddar cheese. So it was a mix of things that we thought people thought dogs liked and sense that we thought we knew dogs liked and, interestingly enough, the peanut butter was the one that was most preferred by all the dogs.
Speaker 2:Oh, bunzen and Beaker, go bananas for peanut butter. For peanut butter, mm-hmm. Huh yeah, it's all that fat, probably fat and protein in it, I don't know.
Speaker 3:I don't know.
Speaker 2:I mean humans love peanut butter too.
Speaker 3:I love peanut butter. I mean peanut butter or anything, peanut butter pie, peanut butter cookies I love it. Yeah, I don't know, I don't know. And so we're actually in the middle of a study we're doing with Texas Tech, we're working with their Animal Behavior Department and we're doing a study with about 50 dogs and what we're doing is we're actually seeing if there's longer playtime based on different sense, like we know that these dogs responded differently to the sense. But we were just super curious if there were sense that kept dogs specific sense that kept dogs engaged longer than other sense. So we're continuing with our research. We have ongoing research all the time. It's a backbone of our company and we always want to scientifically vet out any hypothesis we have or any new development that we're working on.
Speaker 2:That is amazing. Now our fans are going to wonder and they will ask why I didn't ask it. If I didn't ask this, is there any like? In the future, will you be adding a moose leg scent to any of the toys?
Speaker 3:So it's funny because we've had conversations about do we need to add squirrel, Should we add trash? And I don't know if we're able to capture what that smell smells like, and if people, and if we deliver that, if people are going to get it and if it's going to be something that you're going to want to bring into your house, right, ok, that was my other question.
Speaker 2:It's like is the smell powerful enough that you or I could smell it?
Speaker 3:Yes, so we kind of walked this tightrope when we were doing the development where we know obviously dog-sensitive smells way stronger than ours, but we wanted to at least have a hint of it.
Speaker 3:So there was some believability. I mean, if you're telling somebody it smells like peanut butter, if you hand somebody a toy and say this smells like peanut butter, the first thing somebody does because I've seen it a million times is they pick it up and they smell it. So yes, you can smell it. It's not an overwhelming smell, but there is enough where you can detect it and smell it. And it was consideration for us because, on the one hand, we know that dogs have a much stronger sense of smell. We didn't want to make the scent too overwhelming. So you can smell it. It's not overwhelming, it doesn't take over your entire house, but there is a faint smell.
Speaker 2:OK, so if you like, there's a cheddar one. If you picked that up, you'd be like OK, it smells like cheese.
Speaker 3:It literally the cheddar smells like the cheese packet and a Kraft macaroni and cheese oh my goodness, that is.
Speaker 2:Kd is a staple in Canada. Ok, it is a thing Wild. Ok, that is fantastic. I did mention about the potential If you were working on moose legs. Is there anything coming down the pipe that you could give us a hint about without giving too much away? Is there anything else you're working on?
Speaker 3:Well, here's what I'll say. You know, at the end of the day, we're animal lovers and we are looking forward to exploring opportunities to show that love in 2024. Understanding that dogs aren't the only furry friends who complete families.
Speaker 2:And I'll leave it at that. I see what you're saying there. You're kind of putting the cat into the bag a bit early. So to speak. Very cool. So my the big question people who are listening to this are like this is cool, this is amazing. What? Where can you get this stuff?
Speaker 3:Yes, so we are available. You can get it on Amazon, we are on Chewy, if you are so inclined to go the e-commerce route. We're also in PetSmart, both in the US and in Canada, and we are a PetCo and a number of independent pet specialty retailers across North America.
Speaker 2:Are these scented toys relatively new, or have I just been missing them when I've been walking the pet stores?
Speaker 3:We launched. We were first on shelf in 2017. So we've been around for a little while, but I would say we're I mean, we're the only ones there's a few people that are doing they have flavor. We are the only ones that do scented dog toys.
Speaker 2:Have you? This is a silly question have you ever did you have you bitten one of the things Like does it? Has a human tried this? Like does it kind of taste? Because you know smell and taste are linked a bit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it doesn't taste like anything, I think, because all of the scent is micro encapsulated. So I just I don't think, I'm not going. I will neither confirm nor deny that I have chewed on one of our dog toys, but I will say that it probably doesn't take, because that would be my.
Speaker 2:I just have all of these questions in my head because if you have a toddler and a dog in the same house and the thing tastes good, you might have a fight on your hands between the two of them.
Speaker 3:So it's funny that you say that. So we actually made sure that our toys were tested to child safety standards because of the well, I mean because, thinking about how many households that have dogs have young kids, and also because you know, we, these dogs, the toys, we're going to spend a ton of time in a dog's mouth because they are so engaging we wanted to make sure they didn't have daylates or BPA or any sort of unnecessary toxins in them. That because especially because this category is not very regulated here in the US, so it was important to us.
Speaker 2:Okay, Now imagine being the chief innovation officer, the CIO Did I get your title right? Yeah? You did you probably have the ability to take some of the products home to your own dogs. Do they have a favorite scent?
Speaker 3:So, yes, we, we, they have about 150 toys at home. So, because they are, are. That's my first line of testing. So I have two. I've got a seven month old puppy right now and I have a seven year old. The seven month old puppy his absolute favorite scent is cheddar cheese. The seven year old is he's an equal opportunity center, so he likes them all equally.
Speaker 2:I love it. This. This ties into, before we move to kind of our standard questions, and you didn't mention the science that goes into the testing. Like there is a huge movement in dog training to let dogs be dogs at for part of their day with like things like smilfarris have you heard that before? Like smilfarris or sniffari?
Speaker 3:I have. I have not heard of a sniffari, but I love it and it makes perfect sense. Pardon the pun, but I I actually, with our seven month old puppy, we have a line of puppy toys. We developed puppy toys that came out and again, tons of science behind them. There we have two different types of toys because there's kind of two major developmental stages when it comes to puppies, that sort of eight to 16 week period where they're sort of juvenile, and then, you know, I would say four months and older where they're more pre adolescent and they have different needs during that developmental time.
Speaker 3:But anyway, we I brought home our eight to 16 week toys when we first got the puppy and use them as a way of training Bubba to not eat the furniture. So because you know you have a plush toy, you got a sofa pillow, they don't know the difference. So you know, I would give him one of our scented toys and he'd play with it and I'd praise him. And then if he was going, you know was mosey hang over to any of the furnishings in the house and wanting to take a nibble over there. You know, I would say no and then give him the toy again and then praise him when he started, you know, playing with a scented toy. So it was a really kind of painless, easy way of training him to just play with his toys and know that, okay, if something smells like this, it's okay. I get a positive reward. So I could see how, you know, potentially using scent could be, could it could be beneficial for training.
Speaker 2:Just until you bring out the cheddar cheese out of the fridge. You'd probably have to guard that.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, you got to pay the cheese tax. You got to pay the cheese tax.
Speaker 2:So we have some standard questions on the science podcast that we ask our guests about, as we mix science and pets, and you've already mentioned some of your dogs your dogs but we would love for you to tell us a pet story or two from your life.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right, so I have to think of something that doesn't involve personal bodily harm, property damage or trip to the vet. Okay, so here's a good one Our dog I mentioned. We have a six, seven-month-old and a seven-year-old. So our seven-year-old dog, his name is Bluto, it's actually Blutarski, it's Bluto for short. So he gets, during the summertime, he gets hot spots on his paws. I mean, it's an allergic reaction, it's just, it is what it is. And one particular time, you know, he got them pretty bad.
Speaker 3:And there was, you know, the nighttime snorkeling, which makes me lose my mind. It's like nails on a chalkboard. So I had the genius idea to put one of my husband's ankle socks on his foot, on his paw, to keep him from chewing at night. So I thought this was genius. So put the sock on. The next morning I wake up it's gone. I can't find it anywhere. I've looked all over the bedroom, I've looked everywhere that he is and I couldn't find it anywhere. I kept thinking, well, okay, maybe it like rolled under the bed or who knows what. Two days later I'm in the kitchen making coffee and I hear that, that yacking, that vomiting sound that's happening in the dining room and sure enough he barfed up the missing sock.
Speaker 3:So he was so mad about having the sock on his foot that he literally ate it off. Okay.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness.
Speaker 3:Oh, so I don't. I don't know if that's a good story or not, but I'm trying to think of stories that don't involve poop or, like I said, or a hospital visit.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, dogs are basically toddlers and those of us who've had a toddler, toddlers are lots of poop and sometimes hospital visits too, and those of you with young kids or have had young kids, you remember this Very true. And you have two Lee Lee and burgers. Did I say that, Kirk?
Speaker 3:Yes, you did. Yeah, I have to.
Speaker 2:That is a rare breed, I would. I would have to say, not a lot of people know about that dog. Could you just describe it real quick for folks?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, so they're German working dogs. They were bred to look like the town of Lee and Burg's mascot, which is a lion. So they crossed a Newfoundland, a St Bernard, anda, great Pyrenees, and then that's, therein was the Lee and Burger. And you know we, my husband and I, when we first got married and wanted to get a dog, we both wanted a big dog and we took one of those encyclopedia of dog books on a flight one time and just started reading up on all of the different breeds. Love those books. Yep, aren't they amazing. And I just we had like a criteria we didn't want them, we wanted to be able to bring them to the office, we didn't want them to be aggressive, we wanted them to be big, but we didn't want them to be really slobbery. Sorry, I know you have a burner so, and I understand that the slobber beard is real.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it's not a slobbery as his big boy cousins like the Newfies or St Bernard's, but yeah.
Speaker 3:So, so you know, the Lee and Burgers just sort of checked off the box, and so we, you know, we got our first one 20 years ago and we've stuck with the breed ever since.
Speaker 2:They are cool dogs, they're, yeah, every time I've been around them they're just, they've, they've got soulful eyes, kind of like most big dogs have those big soulful eyes and yeah they do.
Speaker 3:They're generally pretty low energy, which is you know kind of great, but yeah, they just do their thing. They're kind of we kind of call them gentle giants. They're just big teddy bears.
Speaker 2:And bigger than Bunsen, like much bigger than a Bernice Mountain dog. You're correct, they're, they're bigger. They're bigger than a Bernice Mountain dog, and that's saying something.
Speaker 3:Definitely. Well, I can tell you my, our seven month old puppy is 106 pounds.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness, I love it. I love big dogs, I love it.
Speaker 3:Me too, me too.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks for sharing that story. That's great, sure. The other standard question we have is a super fact. It's something that you know, that you tell people, and it would blow their minds away. Do you have a super fact?
Speaker 3:Okay, I do, I have. I actually had a couple Okay. So the first one is did you know that dogs have fewer taste buds than humans About 80% fewer, actually.
Speaker 2:That would explain the basic eats. Moose legs in.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right. That's exactly right. They have about 1700 taste buds, versus us, which is about 9,000 taste buds, so what's something tastes like doesn't matter to them as much as what something smells like, which is why, again, they're they're willing to eat goose poop and trash and all of the other disgusting things, but also the reason why you know you can feed them the same food for years and years and years and they don't grow tired of it. Whereas I can't give my husband the same dinner more than once a week, he wants something unique and new every night.
Speaker 2:Except for craft dinner in Canada.
Speaker 3:Call back. Except for craft dinner. Call back.
Speaker 2:That's a super fact. That's great Thanks.
Speaker 3:So then, my other super fact that I thought was really interesting, and again something that I learned through the development of our Pleology Toys, is that dogs smell separately with each nostril. It's actually called sniffing lateralization, wow. So they sniff primarily with their right nostril. When they start sniffing, so for anything that's a familiar or recognized scent, like food, they switch to the left nostril. But something that's unfamiliar or different or exciting, they use the right nostril, and it has to do with how they process that, with pathways in the brain. So the right hemisphere processes unique information, in the left hemisphere processes familiar information.
Speaker 2:I can't even. How do you. Have you ever tried to like only sniff through your right nostril, Like everybody listening right now, as long as like you're not going to make a goof out of yourself, everybody, just try it right now and sniff out of their right nostril. Like how do you? That's like you can plug it. It's impossible, you can plug it Right, but that's so wild, so there you go, that is a super.
Speaker 3:Did that blow you away?
Speaker 2:That blew me away. I did not know. The last one Okay, good, that was. That is crazy. I love it. One of the last questions we asked our guests is to share something that they do outside of their work or, you know, their normal day to day life, sharing something about their hobbies or causes that they're passionate about. You wanted to mention maybe a couple. Uh, Lindy, could you talk about them?
Speaker 3:I did. Yeah, so we are. You know, our company really believes in supporting local charities and giving back to the community and we have two amazing organizations based here in Nashville. The first one is called Wagon Walks and basically they advocate and rescue either wrongfully stereotype breeds like pitties, mama dogs with puppies or dogs with medical conditions pretty much any dog that could be overlooked, you know, in a shelter during an adoption event, and we help to sponsor one of the adoption rooms in their brand new Nashville location and they just they do amazing work and they're really instrumental in the community and helping to get, you know, unwanted dogs out of shelters and into forever home. So we love them, they're amazing.
Speaker 3:The second organization that we partner with here is called old friends and they specialize in senior dogs with medical problems or disabilities and they either help to find them forever homes or, most likely, they keep them at the sanctuary, kind of to live out their retirement years. You know, as a member of the pack, and we send, like to send a team of our, of our employees over to their sanctuary and we use use their, their members of the pack, to test all of our new and fun toys. We have a line of toys that are made specifically for senior senior dogs.
Speaker 3:So we'll bring toys over there and play with all the senior dogs and take some great pictures and do some good social media posts and kind of help spread the love. So those two organizations are amazing. They do a great job. I love it.
Speaker 2:Very cool. It is great to give back that way. You got everybody's heart with the senior dog thing, because I'm not usually not everybody will have a puppy, but everybody usually has a senior dog.
Speaker 3:So yeah, and I mean, and they, you know there's question about when, when, when do you determine whether a dog is senior? Usually they say around after six years or older. Obviously it depends on the breed and how you know the lifespan of the breed, but they spend a pretty decent chunk of their life being seniors and they want to play. They like having a good time too. So a lot of times I think they're a little bit overlooked. So we love partnering with that organization. We really love being able to design and develop products that are specifically for senior dogs so they can play too.
Speaker 2:I love that See Bunsen is now considered a senior and he's six so he but he's just just as much energy as he had when he was a puppy.
Speaker 3:I love it. I don't think Bernice Mountain dogs ever lose their energy.
Speaker 2:They sleep and then, when it's time to play, it's like oh you're, you're a puppy again. Super cute.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. I love they have so many great facial expressions. My favorite is the often used bamboozled expression. Yeah, I feel like that is specific to Bernice Mountain dog.
Speaker 2:See, my wife and I were just talking about that the other day, that Bunsen because of the way I think their face is shaped and with their eyebrows and things like that, like he wears his emotions on his face. He cannot lie, he cannot like when he's, he's mostly happy all the time but like you just know what he's thinking. Whereas beaker, our golden retriever, she has, she has this like blank stare with her dark, dark eyes and we have no idea what she's thinking. We actually call it RBF, the resting beaker face, because it's we just don't know where, like you can look from beaker to Bunsen and we know Bunsen's happy and we know it was beaker happy. I don't know. She's just staring us with with her beaker face. So yeah, I get it.
Speaker 2:This is so true. Yeah, um, lindy, we're at the end of the chat. Thank you so much for agreeing to be a guest on the show today. Of course, the Playology toys can be found on Amazon and in some stores. Do you yourself or your company Playology? Is there social media for that stuff? Can people follow you somewhere?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. We've got Instagram, facebook. We also have our own website. You can buy product on our website at wwwplayologypetscom. We are constantly posting on Instagram and Facebook, so TikTok as well. Give us a like, follow. You can see all the good fun stuff that we're working on. We're one of sponsors at the Westminster Kennel Shelf oh cool. In May this year in New York, which was really fun we were able to talk to some breeders about our amazing toys and get to watch all of the behind-the-scenes stuff, so it was really fun.
Speaker 2:That is neat. Yeah, Well, again thanks for being a guest. This was a fascinating and fun conversation. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you for having me, it was a pleasure.
Speaker 2:We are proud to have Bark and Beyond Supplycom now as an official sponsor of the Science Podcast. Bark and Beyond Supplycom is a small, family-owned company that started off making joint supplements for dogs, but now they sell toys and treats and a whole bunch of other goodies. Skip the big box stores and check out the amazing deals and awesome stuff at Bark and Beyond Supplycom. You'll see a link in our show notes and use the coupon code Bunsen B-U-N-S-E-N for 10% off at BarkandBeyondSupplycom. Click the link. Skip the big box stores. How?
Speaker 1:about the little guy. Okay, it is time for Storytime with me, adam. If you don't know what Storytime is, storytime is when we talk about stories that have happened within the past one or two weeks. I will start. Dad got the last little bit of this on video.
Speaker 1:I don't know if all of the people are aware, but every once in a while, bunsen and Beaker will fight over me on the couch. I'll be sitting there and I'll ask one of them to come up, and then usually it's Bunsen who comes up first. Beaker gets really jealous and she starts putting her head over the side of the couch and looking really pouty. I'm like you come up here too, and then she crawls up on top of me and then lays down. That's what happened. They were both being toddlers. If I stopped petting one of them, the other one would go crazy. Until I pet them. I had to pet both of them at the same time with enough intensity that they didn't go crazy, which is pretty difficult because Bunsen is very needy and Beaker is very jealous. That's my story is that both of the animals were sitting on the couch with me and smothering me, and it was terrible. Yeah, that's my story. Dad, do you have a story?
Speaker 2:I have a story of stories to come. This week we are getting stuff ready for the Comic-Con. Chris and I are going up as a couple on Saturday and then we're going up on Sunday. Adam unfortunately has to work, but Annalise is coming with us. Actually, on Sunday, bunsen and Beaker are special guests at 11 on the red carpet for a meet and greet. Chris did a great job of getting some of their costumes organized and then I've been modifying them bit by bit to make sure they fit the dogs and they're really cute. Beaker's Pikachu is pretty adorable and Bunsen's going to be rocking the Ash, which is one of the main Pokemon guys. Adam, did I get that right? I don't really watch the Pokemon cartoon. Ash is the main character.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Ash and Pikachu are the main characters, Right but it's not Pikachu, it's going to be the Pikachu. She's Pikachu because it's Beaker. Anyways, I don't know if anybody's going to get that pun, but we made that. Somebody made that pun on Twitter and it was hilarious, so we're running it with it now. I think we're going to have some of our cards and stickers to give the kids and our cards to give the adults, and we might have our activity books, like in newspaper slings X-ray, x-ray, you know, and then. So that'll be for. Anyways, it's going to be a lot of fun. I can't wait to see the photos and I think people are going to be pretty excited to see the dogs at the Comic-Con. Anyways, that's my story. It's a story of stories to come. Everybody's been so busy this week. We've just been, we've been just hanging on to get through the week, so that's it.
Speaker 1:Mom, do you have a story?
Speaker 4:I sure do have a story. My story has to do with taking to Beaker. It has to do with taking Beaker to the vet. It has to do with taking Beaker to the vet today. So on Tuesday Adam texted both of us and said hey, I think Beaker has an injury on her cheek. And we said what that's so weird.
Speaker 1:That's not what you said.
Speaker 4:What is what we said? We said we said please take it. We said take a picture of it, take a picture if you have time. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I was worried about her, I was worried about Beaker.
Speaker 4:Adam did not take a picture, I was already gone, adam was already gone, so we did not get to find out about her Owie until Tuesday night. And so on Tuesday night we put the cone on because it seemed like it was weeping a little bit and it seemed like a scratch, that maybe she was worrying a bit, and on with the cone. Beaker doesn't mind the cone, it's not her favorite, but she will put it on Anyway. Then we washed it a little bit and Jason put some polysporin on it and it seemed to harden up a little bit like scab over, which is perfect. But then when we looked at it this morning it kind of had a little bit of a yellowy greenish tinge. And so I called the vet at 730 and said hey, is it possible to get Beaker in at some point today or after school? And I was able to book a time that was after my first period class and then I had some prep time and my lunchtime. So I took Beaker to the vet and she cleaned it up and I said Do you think it's a foreign object in there, like maybe a stick or a piece of glass? I'm not sure where that would come from. I asked her if it looked like a bite, although we haven't seen the beavers. I was just covering all our bases and she said no, it doesn't seem like a bite and it doesn't seem like a foreign object. It does seem like she scratched it and then she was worrying it, which led to a hot spot that got infected. So Beaker now is on antibiotics and she has a wash, and then we're still going to be able to put the polysporin on it.
Speaker 4:Now the vet did say hey, can I shave the area a little bit? And normally the answer would be yes, no problem, looks are nothing, but Beaker is going to the Comic Con on Sunday. So I said Um, actually actually can we talk? I said Beaker is and Bunsen are going to be going to the Comic Con on Sunday, and she says no problem. That's why I always ask.
Speaker 4:And I said what would be the ramifications of not shaving it? And she said Well, it just dries out better, it heals better, it gets air better. But we can always. If this form of treatment doesn't work, we can shave it when next week or in 10 days if you need to come back. And I said that is perfect. So Beaker is going to be the bell of the ball and Bunsen is going to be ash and it's going to be good. But Beaker isn't bell, she's Pikachu Pikachu. But her costume could double as bell. It kind of looks like a bell knockoff. It could. It looks like a bell costume that they just slapped a Pikachu tail on, but you know what? That's a okay. She's so beautiful and cute and it's going to be a great day and her face will be feeling oh so much better because we're going to keep the cone on and it's going to heal over the next few days, which is perfect, and that is my story.
Speaker 1:Okay, we have a special guest this week again. Annalise, do you have a story?
Speaker 5:Yes, my story has to do with yesterday, when Adam was busy and Adam's dad was in here. It was Tuesday, oh, it was Tuesday, okay, it was Tuesday. And so it was just me and Chris and we we were the tag team to take the dogs on the walk. And so you know, she's talking to me and like we're just talking to each other going on a walk, taking the dogs for a walk, and then all of a sudden, halfway through the walk, both of the dogs just run away and I'm yelling for Bunsen and Beaker and Chris's and like not not coming to us. But Beaker did eventually come to us when we, when I ran up to her, but Bunsen, just like he didn't exist anymore. He was like couldn't even hear him, see him, nothing. So we, chris, kept yelling at me to go and run and find Bunsen. She was so stressed and I felt terrible because I'm not a great runner and we go and we go and like we don't find Bunsen, can.
Speaker 4:I interject, adam told me Annalise was a great runner and that she could run faster and further than he could, and I said, okay, that's perfect, he lied.
Speaker 5:He lied and it didn't help that I was in rubber boots that are too small for me, but anyways, I digress. So we go like deep into the creek and the forest and like we don't see anything of him, and then Chris is like he went back home. And then he she kept telling me, go run back home really quick to see if he's there and I'm like how can I do that really quick? It's going to take me 15 minutes. But I started running home and she was running home too with me and I was going through the creek area yeah, you were going through the creek, I was going on the top and we go back to their house and Bunsen isn't there and I'm like, okay, we can't stress, because I feel like Bunsen would come back. Like worst case scenario, he doesn't come back, but I'm very, very sure he's going to come back. And next thing, you know, one minute later, bunsen is running back home and it's fine, everything is okay. But yeah, that's my story of Bunsen going on a little adventure.
Speaker 1:But just so that everyone who's listening is aware, the dogs know exactly when we're talking about them in story time and they look at me and they look at mom and they look at Annalise when we're telling stories about them and they just know. And when we say that they're good, they just know that they're good and they're so cute laying on the ground Beaker is looking at me now but yeah, they know when we're talking about them because they're smart. But yeah, I just wanted to say that Thank you for listening to my section of the podcast. I'll see you on the next one. Bye, bye.
Speaker 2:That's it for another week's show. Thanks for coming back every single episode to listen to us or even listening to SciChat and Pet Chat recordings. We love connecting with you on social media about the show. We'd like to thank Lindy Beatty, who talked to us about the toys from Playology and the sniffy science that goes into them. Finally, we'd like to give a shout out to the top dogs. These are the top tier of our paid community, the Pop-Hack Plus. If you want to hear your name, check out the link and think about supporting us as a member of the Pop-Hack. Take it away, Chris, For science, empathy and cuteness. Thank you.