Well, have you ever exercised? I mean yourself that is, not your dog. After you did it, did you notice any special feeling? Sort of like lower stress, relaxation, etc?

Have you ever exercised a bunch of days in a row? Did you notice any special feeling, sort of like feeling stronger, more energetic maybe healthier?

Multiply that all by 10 and that's what it means to a dog. Dogs descend from wolves who don't work 9-5 doing telemarketing, they move around a lot from place to place, looking for food and stuff like that.

 

Depending on breed, and age of dog. it would depend on how much excersise they need. some dogs, like mine, a 15 min leash walks 4 times a day would be a waste of time for us. He needs running and swimming to tire him out.

mental stimulation works to keep a dog happy. dogs were bred to work, and do different types of jobs. not just sit around and be pretty (well some WERE bred to be lap dogs)

Dogs who lack excersise, mental stimulation, and guidance become destructive, annoying, ill mannered and can lead to agression to other dogs, humans or both.

 

what if i go biking for like 15 minutes and do like 2 miles in that time frame?

is it based on distance, time/intensity or what?

i.e. 1 hour of walking for about 6 miles or 30 minute intense 6 miles?

 

Well, to answer your question, try withholding walks for a few days on end. Then you'll probably see why dogs need good long walks every day. You might have to buy a new couch though.

Seriously, though: dogs need to get out of the house to burn both physical and mental energy. Physical energy is the energy you burn when you go for a jog, or go to the gym. Even if you don't actively exercise, it's the energy you burn when you take the train to work. Energy that your dog can't burn if he spends the whole day indoors sleeping.

Then your dog needs to burn mental energy. This is the energy you burn while working in the office or even while going to the mall or watching a movie. It's what keeps you from being bored. He needs to take in new sights, sounds and smells, meet new people and new dogs, so he doesn't go stir-crazy at home looking at the same four walls.

Time, distance and intensity are all variables that affect the amount of energy burned... and the amount of energy your dog has to burn is dependent on his breed, his size, his age and of course his individual character.

 

Dogs are born to run....well, actually trot.....over very long distances all day long. A sled dog team will average 100 miles a day....while pulling a sled. Granted, they're conditioned for that level of physically demanding work. The general guidelines for exercise are based on the energy level of the dog, ie; high energy dogs 'need' 12-15 miles of running/trotting/walking a day; medium energy dogs 6-10 miles and low energy dogs 1-5 miles.

Mental exercise (tricks, training, problem solving) can be just as tiring as physical activity. Dogs need both so, many folks alternate the daily activities/routines.

 

Many of the more difficult dog behaviours to deal with nowadays can be directly related to lack of exercise/stimulation for the dog. We live in a technological society now and the days of inactivity that WE are used to means the dogs do not get the same exercise they did before we became sedentary.

Walking your dog is not JUST about exercise but also a chance for your dog to be stimulated and use his inborn senses and working characteristics to be mentally and physically healthy.

Running your dog on your bike is a good form of aerobic exercise, especially if you have a high energy breed, but still does not take into account his need for FREE running, scenting, play and other forms of stimulation. It's about balance.

Exercise releases endorphins in the brain and this stimulates serotonin as well, calming the dog in general.

There ARE people out there who's dogs only get out to do their "business"...and those dogs are, IMO, neglected. These are the dogs that experience excessive anxiety, destructive behaviours and an inability to learn in training.

Regular exercise is important for BOTH the human and the dog.

 

i never thought about why my grandma's weiner dog was so unwilling to learn and listen. now i know! she only let's her out to go potty. sometimes if the weather is nice she will tie her up out back but she doesn't have tons of room to run or walk around. she just lays there. when i watched her we went for a long walk down a path by a pond and she LOVED it. she came home, drank water, and fell asleep. lol.

my question:

how old must you wait before you can take them on walks? my dog is 3/4 cocker spaniel and 1/4 lab. she is too young to be walked now but is the rule of thumb that after she has all her vaccinations she can start walking? and how can i play with her outside without walking that will tire her enough to sleep well that night?

 

A client of mine has a separate room in their house for their dog... In the center of a room is a treadmill... lol! You see where I'm going with this don'tcha'?? lol! Whenever the dog starts acting hyperactive, they put him on the treadmill and run him for 15-20. (Not run him into the ground, but he alternates from running, to trotting, to walking, then back up again...)

It's not a great alternative, but both of that dog's owners are too lazy to walk with their dog, lol! But it does seem to work for a bit, like I said- It's not a recommendation, and it's not a great alternative either...

 

I'll admit that Donatello doesn't really get the amount of physical activity he should get... He "appears" fine with it of course, he's a lazy-bum like me! : P

When I can I either take him to the dog park for a couple hours, or the last couple weeks I've taken him over to my father's house where he romps with three other dogs who are healthy as horses!

I don't take him for long walks for several reasons; 1) Being that there are hundreds of dogs here at my apartment complex, Donatello has already gotten worms twice, and is now on preventative treatment until farther notice. 2) There are many many dogs that get loose, or are strays, that find their way here into my complex; They look disoreinted, frightened and stressed; Donatello is a little pea-brain compared to these dogs and I'm terrified of having to break up a dog fight between a cocky-s*** and a crazed Pit-Bull. 3) It's not safe to wander around my apartment complex; There are shoot-outs, which have decreased since an officer has moved in, but there have been stabbings, shoot-outs, and weird creepy people offering my sisters "rides".

Now, I'm sure many of you will think those are just excuses, but c'mon, I'm not going to risk my life and my dog's life, risk the chance he could be infected by a stray cat that charges him...

There are other things you can do... I do them. I take him to a dog park, where I'm hoping it'll be a *little* cleaner than my complex, and where it's 100% safer than my complex... I make Donatello go through his list of tricks two, three times a day... I try to compensate for the list of excuses I've made above.

 

Think of it this way: imagine you were kept in a locked room 24 hours a day, with no books, TV, music, or internet, and had to interact with the same annoying people every day. Not fun, eh?

Now imagine you were, say, a Labrador Retriever. Your body was designed to dive into the icy Newfoundland waters, swim a hundred yards, grab a downed duck, swim back - then do it again. Your brain was bred to meet & love any and every person & dog in the whole world. Every fiber of your being is screaming to get out there and do something, meet someone. Instead you're stuck in the same house, the same yard, all day, every day. How sane do you think you would be?

Most dogs are descendants of working breeds, and carry a lot of the same needs & behaviors. Honestly, I wonder if the hours of walk, play, & training I do are enough for my dog to be truly happy, as opposed to merely not-insane from boredom.

 

1 1/2 hours a day? That's it?

Well, Wally's about done for the day then - just got back in from a 60 minute walk as well as some clicker training and some sniff-around time.

He's currently knocked out dead-dog sleep.

Wally gets about 3 hours of walks every day, sometimes 4 hours, depending on weather, etc, and 30 minutes of training/mental exercises every day. He probably could go longer (he doesn't show he's tired very often unless I've totally wiped him out), but when done - he drinks some water and hits the sack.

Works really well to keep him sleep all night. It's about the only time, sans an occasional nap, he gets any major sleep. Rest of the time he's walking, playing, training, or just following me around like a stalker.

It also helps with the socialization, even in an "older" dog. Wally missed that 'socialization window' by a mile, but he's still socializing to things and gotten FAR better (makes me doubt the 'window' theory but instead think socialization is a constant, ever-changing, process), a lot of that, imo, is him being out in the world 20+ hours a week.

 

It also helps with the socialization, even in an "older" dog. Wally missed that 'socialization window' by a mile, but he's still socializing to things and gotten FAR better (makes me doubt the 'window' theory but instead think socialization is a constant, ever-changing, process), a lot of that, imo, is him being out in the world 20+ hours a week.

The socialization window is not necessarily a hard and fast rule, but it is well researched...a dog does much better if exposed to things (like the list I typed earlier) during this window because the brain is still developing at a high speed and it "sticks' better..that being said, many a dog can be socialized at a later age...a lot depends on the dog and the owner's willingness/ability to make up for the missed early socialization. If you don't do the puppy socialization you haven't failed, but you certainly will find it more difficult as time goes by to make up for the initial, early exposure. You are doing well by your dog, that in itself makes a difference!

They did extensive research during the "super dog" development in the US forces twenty or thirty years ago. They took a bunch of very young pups, all from the same lines (GSD's I believe) and divided them into two groups. One group they started very early with physical stimulation (tipping the dogs upside down for short periods, exposure to noises, smells and hot and cold temperatures). The other group had none of these stimulations. At the end of the experiment the stimulated dogs had a very quick stress "bounce back" and showed no fear of odd stimuli, enhancing their ability to learn without anxiety. The unstimulated/unexposed dogs showed extreme stress and fear with novel situations and were deemed unsuitable for the superdog program.

It's for many of the same reasons that infant humans that have been abandoned or are in long term NICU care have to have physical contact with caregivers very early on to ensure proper emotional and physical development.

It may not be the one thing that prevents fear issues in dogs, but it sure as heck puts them on the right path.

 

I was reading that you're supposed to walk your dog 1.5 hours a day, regardless of weather and such. I'm just curious as to why this is necessary?

I believe it comes from the tired old story that dogs descended from wolves, and the generalization that wolves travel large distances to survive...except that's not the whole story, and completely inaccurate if resources are plentiful. This is even more of an exception for feral dogs. They, being mostly scavengers, take from a location and invest most of their energy into hazard avoidance, not traveling. Don't get me wrong, exercise is great, but in moderation. What I believe to be more important than exercise is enrichment...the dog using his mental faculties in new, controlled, and dog-ed ways.

 

Why get a dog if you do not want or do not care about the dog's needs? They NEED exercise! (How much depends of course on the breed .)
As a dog owner you have a responsibility to ensure that your dog feels as good as possible, ensure that it receives a rich life, by going walking at least 3-5 days a week, and make sure that the dog will be activated mentally every now and then. If you think that just being out in the garden all day long is enough for a dog, maybe you should get a teddy bear instead, they requires nothing

 

My dogs get walked for 20-30 minutes a day or every other day. Sometimes they get walked an hour. It all depends on what I have time for. If I walked my dogs for 3-4 hours a day I would have no time to do anything else. If I got up early and walked the dog for an hour I would still get home at 5:30 and end up walking the dogs until 8:30 and then I'd only have a few hours to keep up with housework, errands and all the normal stuff to keep the house running. My dogs do fine with the walks I give them.

 

I think it depends on the breed, the neighborhood, the dogs personality, and their health. To say that all dogs need to be walked 1.5 miles a day is too general I think.

 

As your German Shepherd paces back and forth and around over there and back again.. wearing a path in the rug, poking the cats with her nose and annoying you because it has been pouring rain for 4 days straight... and you HAVE walked but only 2 miles each day.. and you HAVE clicker trained for 2 half hour sessions...

..that is when you will know why you need to walk your dog so long.

Hulk is right.. you might never have time for a lot of other things..

 

As your German Shepherd paces back and forth and around over there and back again.. wearing a path in the rug, poking the cats with her nose and annoying you because it has been pouring rain for 4 days straight... and you HAVE walked but only 2 miles each day.. and you HAVE clicker trained for 2 half hour sessions...

Boy do I understand that...

And I don't even have a Shepard.

Shortened walk due to rain/storm = wet dog shaking and running around bored, energized, and loving being wet and thinking everything else should feel his wet joy

 

I walk for about 40minutes daily, which wipes her out.

However, she is down to 20minutes for a little while, because I have something wrong with my foot and limping for 20minutes hurts a little less than 40.

But, to counter that, I will be getting my neighbor to bring her dog over every couple of days so they can run around like crazy things to get a few more kinks out while my foot heals

 

Mine gets at least one (normally 2) walks a day. Hes only 3 1/2 mths but I do find it hard to keep it to 15 mins (5 mins per month). Today we went to the beach this morning for 1 1/2 hrs and he ran about while we paddled and then we've had puppy school for an hour this evening. He still ran around like mad when we got in so Im thinking its not too much. Tomorrow I'll prob only take him for one short walk/run about as hes done a lot today.
When hes fully grown he'll get an hours walk everyday and longer on weekends. He prob would be happy with half an hour but were an active family and we could stay out as long as was needed.

 

I think it depends on the dog (just as everyone else seems to). I don't have time to walk mine 1.5 hours a day every day, but when I don't I pay for it. She has so much energy that she jumps around and annoys me to no end when she's hyper.

 

I think everyone hit on the reasons why it's a good idea to walk your dogs...why the 1.5 hours though, I have no idea. It seems to be an arbitrary number, some dogs need less and some dogs need more. I walk mine because it's something they seem to enjoy, they get very excited when I get the leashes or when I say "walk". We don't walk 1.5 hours...usually only 30 minutes in the evening, the border collie I'll sometimes walk for 45 minutes. We walk slow, they sniff things, we greet other dogs and I chat with neighbors. Sometimes we work on training with distractions. It's more a social time than an exercise time....honestly they get more hard exercise chasing eachother in the yard, and if I really want to exercise them, they go off leash at the lake.

 

For a dog like an Aussie, walking is not enough exercise. They need full speed frisbee or chasing a ball for around half an hour every day and sometimes twice.

 

It really depends on the dog, some can 20mins and be happy.
While others take hours.

My dogs gets 2-3 hour walk in the morning.
When I didn't walk them for 2 days. I went upstairs and found a destory pillow all over the floor.

 

Levi is getting close to 5 months old now, and she gets about an hour a day. (1/2 hour in the morning, 1/2 hour in the evening) As well as quick little 'walks' around the back of my building for pee breaks. On weekends, she gets walked close to two hours a day. I'm not sure if that's excessive for her (she's mostly pug) but she seems to love it.

However... she'll miss one of her walks if there is lightening and once winter comes, I'm not taking her outside in a blizzard! So I think that some weather does permit a cancelled walk. I'll still take her out for her pee breaks, but like hell I'm going to force her out for a walk if I can't see 4 feet in front of me due to snow! I will admit that if the windchill hits below -20•C, I'll probably cancel the walk or it will be quite a short one! I'm a wimp when we get those cold fronts. I'm not sure, but I would think my small pug/cocker spaniel will not enjoy -30•C wind chills either...

 

I'm a wimp when we get those cold fronts. I'm not sure, but I would think my small pug/cocker spaniel will not enjoy -30•C wind chills either...

Ahhh those are the days I wish I had a "less active" breed. Blaze and I are still out blizzard, -30, cant see 3 feet infront of you. Playing at the freaking dog park. with me dressed like a crazy women. and him loving the cold lol

 

I wish my dogs only needed an hour and a half of walking to be happy, haha. Well sometimes. If I wanted low energy dogs I wouldn't have gotten mine!

If I don't exercise my dogs (physically and mentally) I end up with chewed shoes, dog fights, lots of balls in my lap, cats being chased, chewed furniture, socks dismantled and put into piles (toe end in one pile, heel end in other, thanks to Lloyd), wet noses poking me, a gsd pacing in circles around me . . . . its just easier (and cheaper) to exercise them.

Thankfully I work at a dog daycare and if the weather is really bad I can just take them to work, let them play all day and then run them around on agility equipement (indoors) to tire them out

 

The trick with socialization is that no, you can't provide EVERYTHING a dog will ever encounter. THe trick is to provide enough different things in a positive way that you cover MOST of the major things, and you let the dog practice HOW to react to a novel situation or stimulus. ("Wow, new stuff, okay, sniff around and then back to work.")

 

Interesting experiment - this raises the question of is socialization the one time where "dogs are poor generalizers" tend not to apply? For example, it is highly difficult to expose a dog to everything he or she is likely to face - so how much of the socialization gets generalized to create the bold curiosity to new stimuli?

Dogstar answered this one pretty well:

The trick with socialization is that no, you can't provide EVERYTHING a dog will ever encounter. THe trick is to provide enough different things in a positive way that you cover MOST of the major things, and you let the dog practice HOW to react to a novel situation or stimulus. ("Wow, new stuff, okay, sniff around and then back to work.")

I will add that this has to do with low level stressors (environmental "new things") added to the puppy's socialization in small increments, gradually increasing the duration of exposure.This helps to build up a resistance to the stress hormones released and also helps build new neuronal pathways in the brain..so you are taking into account that dogs don't generalize well but are teaching their brains and systems to be able to handle the body/mind reaction to new things when they do occur so that eventually they CAN generalize it.

There was a time when neuroscientists felt that at a certain age (young adulthood) neuroplasticity no longer existed and the brain will have "settled" into any patterns it had learned early on. They now know differently, that the brain can change and adapt well into adulthood and even into old age (hence all the "brain games" for older people to help prevent age related memory loss etc.) But a brain that hasn't had the exposure and chance to build a good network in the beginning (ie the "window" in infancy and young childhood) is at a disadvantage in how much change, and how quickly it can occur. If you don't "use it" it gets lost and new pathways are needed to develop that particular type of learning.

Side note: Tipping them upside down? You mean, holding them so their heads are facing down and butt in the air? I want to try this on Wally to see how he reacts but of course, only when I know how to do it

Imagine having a tube partially filled with water (or even better, one of those multicoloured sand and water toys) that you tip and turn and rotate to get the sand to settle in different places. If you do it too quickly or too roughly it becomes a scramble and is ruined. But if you hold it gently and slightly tip to one side or the other and then back, the sand settles differently each time. It's almost like a soft rocking motion..with pauses built in at the end of each "swing". The initial exercise is literally, gentle tip towards the floor, pause a second or two, and then right the dog.

People do with this their infants all the time...support the head and neck so no flailing or injury can occur and swoop the baby around, up down, side to side...we do it because we like it and it makes the baby smile, laugh whatever.. This sort of action has many positive benefits in the infant's brain, equilibrium and enjoyment of movement being only a couple of things.

 

I will add that this has to do with low level stressors (environmental "new things") added to the puppy's socialization in small increments, gradually increasing the duration of exposure.This helps to build up a resistance to the stress hormones released and also helps build new neuronal pathways in the brain..so you are taking into account that dogs don't generalize well but are teaching their brains and systems to be able to handle the body/mind reaction to new things when they do occur so that eventually they CAN generalize it.

There was a time when neuroscientists felt that at a certain age (young adulthood) neuroplasticity no longer existed and the brain will have "settled" into any patterns it had learned early on. They now know differently, that the brain can change and adapt well into adulthood and even into old age (hence all the "brain games" for older people to help prevent age related memory loss etc.) But a brain that hasn't had the exposure and chance to build a good network in the beginning (ie the "window" in infancy and young childhood) is at a disadvantage in how much change, and how quickly it can occur. If you don't "use it" it gets lost and new pathways are needed to develop that particular type of learning.

Ahh - it's all very interesting about how brains work. Thanks for this (and you to Dogstar)

And it sounds likes "socialization" is a really bad term. It has nothing to do with "being social" but it's more about teaching the dog to cope with/enjoy discovering new things. It's like teaching coping skills on a different level than what I have to do with Wally (a more positive/preventative level).

That's something completely different than developing social confidence and experience, imo.

It does give me an idea. I might just spend a week showing him stuff he's not seen and c/t him for sniffing at it, just to see what might happen.

Imagine having a tube partially filled with water (or even better, one of those multicoloured sand and water toys) that you tip and turn and rotate to get the sand to settle in different places. If you do it too quickly or too roughly it becomes a scramble and is ruined. But if you hold it gently and slightly tip to one side or the other and then back, the sand settles differently each time. It's almost like a soft rocking motion..with pauses built in at the end of each "swing". The initial exercise is literally, gentle tip towards the floor, pause a second or two, and then right the dog.

People do with this their infants all the time...support the head and neck so no flailing or injury can occur and swoop the baby around, up down, side to side...we do it because we like it and it makes the baby smile, laugh whatever.. This sort of action has many positive benefits in the infant's brain, equilibrium and enjoyment of movement being only a couple of things.

I'm so doing this. I've gotten the picture of the movements thanks to your description.

Wally's probably gonna think I'm some kind of weirdo. He probably already dreads me reading or coming here because I always pick up some idea to try out on him.