flehmen
FLAY-men
A mammalian behavior in which the animal curls back its upper lip, bares its front teeth, and inhales — drawing air across the vomeronasal organ in the roof of the mouth. Horses, cats, elk, and goats all do it. The face they make looks like laughter or disgust. It is neither. It is a deeper kind of smelling.
Etymology
German: flehmen (to curl the upper lip, to bare the upper teeth). From Upper Saxon dialect flemmen (to look spiteful). Introduced as a scientific term in 1930 by Karl Max Schneider, director of the Leipzig Zoo.
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