A San Diego, California, man tweets his request for a term for what a dog does when she’s happily writhing around on the grass. How about shnerking? Other terms people use for it are stink bathing, mole diving, itchy-scratchies, flea smothering, scruffling, or being a grass shark. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “A Word for Dogs Rolling Around on Their Backs in the Grass”
On Twitter, a guy who goes by the handle Mikey Photos TCRG, who is a photographer here in San Diego, wrote to us and said, “I need to know what it’s called when a dog is writhing around in the grass, kind of like on their back with their belly exposed and paws up, right? And they’re not rolling in a scent or anything, right?”
Well, they could be. His family calls it schnerking. S-H-N-E-R-K-I-N-G. Rhymes with twerking. Schnurking. And he wonders if anybody else uses that term. And I couldn’t find anybody else who does, but people sure have words for this.
They do, don’t they? Yeah. Yeah, I did an informal poll of my friends, and they refer to that action as stink bathing, if the dog is in it.
Right, if there’s like a dead animal or a doggy dude or some other dude that they’re rolling in. Yeah, when my Labrador used to do that, I would call it mole diving because it was usually a rotting mole.
Yeah, we had a beagle that would love any old dead thing, and she would roll in it. Oh, yeah? Yeah. Or then just the more benign itchy scratchies or flea smothering or scruffling or being a grass shark.
Grass shark. Yeah, or a rug shark if you’re doing it indoors. But everybody knows, every dog lover knows that action. I always wonder if it’s something akin to bears needing to rub themselves on trees.
It’s a mammal thing that we love to have our backs scratched. Maybe that’s what they’re doing. Well, they look so joyous, right? Don’t they? Yeah. Dogs, man, they’re game for anything.
Well, maybe you have a term for it or a story about language you’d like to share. Call us 877-929-9673 or send your thoughts an email to words@waywordradio.org.
