allthingsdog: Let Pets Witness Euthanasia?

According to the book, dogs can smell minute changes in a dog's/animals scent that may mean they can "smell" the death of the animal as it's happening, and that may help them grasp what happened? It's also said that if it isn't possible for the surviving pets to witness the euthanasia, allow the pets to sniff something of the pet's that he or she was wearing during the euthanasia, like their collar, so they know what happened to their friend. If I was a human mind in a dog's body, though, I would *not* want to have that "holy crap, my sister/brother/comrade-in-arms is dead!" be forced on me without warning.

I'm not sure how fully dogs grasp the concept of death...certainly not as well as we can, or as well as elephants and dolphins have proven to grasp it, but definitely more fully than a solitary animal who doesn't live in a structured social group. So it probably *would* be helpful for the pet to participate in the death process somehow. However, if they understand it *too* well, forcing them to witness the euthanasia would psychologically harm them, like it psychologically hurts *us* to see euthanasia/death of a loved one occur.

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