Barley’s Mental Map

Every morning Barley runs down the front steps and takes a right. He’s gotten so predictable that I decided to let him lead the entire walk and see what kind of map formed. What made Barley’s mental map of the neighborhood? Was it the markings of other dogs? People?

Well, we never found out because we only made it to the end of the block before Barley had satisfied himself with the latest marking before looking to me to decide on directions. Not much of a map. The rest of the walk I tried to let him pick which way to go (except up people’s walkways) and it seemed his default was to go straight or look to me for some small cue about direction. I was a longer walk than normal and he never gave me the sad eyes when he realized we were turning back towards the house. Still, not quite what I was hoping for. No GIS project.