Good catch, O.G., we have two of those and it never occurred to me.
I would guess that something about the water cremation process is not as sanitizing as fire. Whether or not it smells like your dog still, it likely does smell somewhat like rotting animal.
I’m glad you’ve adopted another dog. My condolences on your loss.
This is what I was going to chime in to say. We did not keep our dog’s ashes, but the vet gave us a clay/ceramic plaque with our dog’s footprint in it, and our other dog could not stop smelling the plaque and reacting to it. Since basset hounds have such a keen sense of smell, I think s/he was reacting to the scent of the pawprint.
So sorry for your loss, Daffyd, and I am so happy you rescued another dog 
Scent to a dog is like vision to a person. When you look outside, you see thousands of interesting things all at once. You focus in on tiny things that catch your interest. You see it all, but just focus on what interests you. That’s what it’s like for dogs and scents. They may be hit by all kinds of scents at once, but they are able to focus on the ones that interest them.
You can also think about how you hear sounds. You can go to a loud city or concert filled with lots of different noises, but you can still hear your friend talking next to you. You can easily focus on an individual sound among hundreds of other simultaneous sounds.
Our noses don’t work the same way, so we assume dogs would be overwhelmed by the scents like our noses would. But they have much, much better scent processing than we do. I’ve heard that a dog’s sense of smell is 10,000 to 1,000,000 times better than ours. Dogs probably “see” the world through their nose more than through their eyes.
As for your Golden, I would think it’s more trace scents from her body on the box left behind by the tech when he was handling them. The tech may have gotten your Golden prepared and then got the box for afterwards, leaving scent on the box where he touched it. That would be my guess more than from the ashes themselves.
It is possible that some odors remain and your dog detected them, but I suspect rather more likely that it was the “Clever Hans” effect at work - that is, you dog was reacting to the unconscious cues you were giving her that this box was important and a source of strong emotions.
This is often how pets appear to “know” things they could not possibly know: they don’t actually, but they know their owners very, very well, and read a lot from how their owners react, and thus appear to “know” things that their owners know.
[A control would be if the dog reacted strongly to the box if it was shown to her by someone who didn’t know what was in it. Then, scent would be the only reasonable explanation.]
Here’s a fun Basset fact: A Basset’s long ears are not for better hearing–they’re to help with smell. When he’s sniffing the ground, his long ears are used to sweep up air and ground scents to better allow his nose to smell things. His ears are like brooms to sweep smells into his nose.
How so? My son-in-law’s dad runs the crematorium for a vet’s office. Nothing godly about it - just disposing of waste.
Good post filmore. I recall reading that a roughly equivalent portion of the dog’s brain is allotted to smell, as a human’s is to sight. Think of a bloodhound tracking a trail. In addition to identity, it is sensing time and direction. Likely even emotion/mental state.
I just knew someone was going to pounce on that. Thanks for nothing. See if you get a “bless you” next time you sneeze in my vicinity. :mad:
If one is a renter, pet crematoria are a good thing to have around (better?) when there’s no place to bury your friend and tossing them in the dumpster–probably illegal–or leaving them at the vet doesn’t sit well with one’s feelings.
Strange Story
I’ll keep the long story brief: Our female had a puppy and it was killed in an accident. We cremated it in my workshop woodstove, very thoroughly. Waited for the ashes to cool, buried them (deep) in a raised garden/flower box.
Planted all kinds of veggies in there for a couple seasons.
This spring, I tilled up this box to add in some fresh soil and mix it up. The female dog *went right to the spot *the ashes were buried and started sniffing and digging and generally acting strange.
That was seriously weird.
Wasn’t (entirely) intending to be snarky. Essentially - what do you think happens with the pets that are left at a Vet after euthanizing? Your post did not distinguish between utlitarian and <insert adjective here> crematoria. I’ve heard more than I need to know about the issues involved in burning seriously obese dogs, or how long it takes to incinerate a St. Bernard…
Some folk (IMO) go over-the-top in burying/memorializing their pets. Hell - my sister manages a florist in a tony town. I could tell you about $10k worth of flowers for a dead shih tzu, and a Swarovski shih tzu shaped purse holding some of the ashes…
Hell - I’ve threatened to have my last several goldens stuffed. Haven’t carried through on it yet… 
I guess I want to believe that my dog knew it was her friend, and the same with your dog…
I remember when my cat died in 2009, and my other cat (whom I still have - he’s about 17 years old 
) reacted that way. She died at home, with me by her side, and he ran to the back bedroom. I brought him back to say goodbye before I took her to the vet for cremation, and as soon as I set him down, he ran back. He did the same thing when I got the towel in the container out for him to sniff it. He knew.
I think I’ve mentioned that I inherited my mother’s cats when she died in March. It took us six days before we got her ashes, and both cats looked all over the house for her every single day… And stopped looking for her the day we brought home her ashes. It’s probably coincidental, but it’s kinda freaky.
Fascinating responses, thanks.
That’s probably it, but the other 3 dogs paid no attention to that spot whatsoever.
According to today’s column, I seriously understated the number of nasal sensory receptors. Woof!
Consider making a dog-copter.