I once planned a birthday party for a dog. He ate the cake in four seconds, knocked over a stack of presents looking for more cake, and left before the group photo. I have not tried to organize a party game for a dog since.
The Dodo tried anyway, and it went about the way you would expect. For Shadow’s fifth birthday, Dodo editor Valentina and her husband built him a piñata with a piece of jerky from Caledon Farms tied to the pull string, the treat sitting there as the prize at the end. The design assumes the dog will pull the string. Shadow did not pull the string. Shadow went straight for the jerky, and by the sound of it, barely chewed.
In his defense, the string was never his idea. Somebody hung his favorite snack inside a cardboard box and then offered him a second, more complicated route to reach it. No dog is going to stand in line for the mechanism when the food is already right there. Mine does the same thing with the treat puzzle I bought him in a moment of optimism. He ignores the sliding panels, flips the thing over, and eats off the floor. His dinner meeting starts at 4:15 sharp, so he is not unclear about his relationship with food.
Video by The Dodo. More of their dog videos are at youtube.com/@TheDodo.
Shadow got his treat, which is the part that matters to Shadow. My own dog inspects the groceries with the same focus and no patience for the systems I build around his food. The party game was for us. The jerky was for him.