Do dogs get walked less in winter

[disneyspendingmoney]

This is my first winter with dogs and I find walking them to be a bit of a chore. But I've noticed a lot less dogs out and about, I initially out this down to it being dark most of the time when I'm out with mine or us my dog walking routine a bit excessive.
6am I take them for 20min toilet walk, then at 7:40 I walk them and dc2 to school, drop dc2 off at 8 and walk them till 8:30, then go to work. 1pm I pop home and give them a 20min toilet walk. DC1 gives them a 20min toilet walk at 4, then at 6:30 I take them out until 8. Then at about 10:45 give them a 45min bedtime walk.

I've started to notice that there are hardly any dogs out and about, I've encountered none this evening, which is quite good really as ddog2 seems to wind other dogs up.

Is there something I don't know about winter dog walking?

Mine do, largely because they won't go out in adverse conditions. Which to one of them is anything other than no wind, precipitation or temperature below 10 or above 22 degrees. He literally dodge his feet in and has to be dragged down the road.
When the weather is and I drag them round the village twice a day (twenty mins) and they go out in the garden in between times.
When it's nice we do an hour in the morning and an hour up at night. But they are jack Russell's and seem fine with any amount of walking it seems, a little or a lot.

I was totally up for walking my dog twice a day in all weathers and at night before I got him. However, after a while I soon learnt that dragging a miserable dog about who clearly hates heavy rain or trying to coax a scared dog in the dark is futile and I was just doing it because it was expected.

On the other hand he loves a 20 minute training session and is panting and shattered afterwards.

My dog won't leave the house when it's cold (I.e frosty) or raining. She takes a look outside and runs to the sofa.

Bella gets two walks a day, she doesn't toilet in the garden so she goes twice a day. Today I took her 7.30am for 45 minutes and 6.30pm for 30 minutes. She won't toilet again until tomorrow morning. I could stand on the garden all day and she won't go and I'm only doing two walks a day so she just goes then. Pretty sure there is no need to walk so often tbh.

Definitely more than mine year round, but mine are toy sized and one is possibly part hairless, very thin almost see through coat with no undercoat. So she won’t go out if it’s too wild outside.

Over walking can overstimulate them just like not walking them can leave them bored n hyped up. If the neutered male needs out for a wee after 8hours it could be his age/routine but instead of the 6am walk he could go out for 10/15minutes till he was relieved before the school run.

Really I’d be telling your ex to pay for a walker or come walk them herself part of the time it’s a very full on routine for anyone, let alone someone on their own with kids.

Jellylegss
my ex is an active addict, so the dcs are worried about the dogs saftey. Plus there are a few other "things" that mean it's a bit complicated.

The neutered one is about one and a half I really thought getting him done would change his attitude, but it hasn't. He seems to revel in attacking his brother and winding up other dogs.

My dogs get 3 walks a day. Here's the pattern for January so far -

Early morning before work - 20 minutes(ish)
I'm home around 3pm so I take them out for an hour or two (depending if it's pissing down).
9pm - a walk around the block before bed -15 mins

They use the cat flap if they need to go out the garden to toilet inbetween.

We are definitely out more in the Summer months.

They have 3 walks everyday. They may be a bit shorter during rainy days. I try to take them for a good run at the beach once a week, for a couple of hours, even when it's teeming down 🤧 On very rainy days their walks are shorter so I do some tricks, sniffing games and training indoors with them. That tires them out.

I tend to walk further in the winter as mine really doesn't like heat.

Summer walks are generally shorter and at either end of the day.

That sounds really excessive

Not sure mine would go out, she doesn't do wet, cold or windy...

Weekday routine...

7am - our in garden for minutes to toilet

Sleeps 8am until 4pm - never asks to toilet.

Fairly often after 4pm she will ask to go out to toilet often After her supper 6/7pm.

Bedtime 10/11 is forced out to toilet!

Sometimes she will get a walk either very short or possibly an hour during the day. She does rave around in the morning to wake everyone up and she gets played with in the evening and insists in coming out in the car with me

So yep you can drop some walls especially as they aren't keen to go out and hide

about the weeing.
8 hours is about as long as most dogs can go between wees.
So yes, mine goes out at 11pm, and then again as soon as we wake up. (That is usually by 7 am, but can be 8 or later at the weekend.)
But literally for about 1 minute, long enough to wee, that is what we mean be a wee break, rather than a walk. Go out, wee, come back.

If they don't wee on command, then start saying WEEE in a clear firm voice as they are weeing, every time, so they associate the wee with the word. Then eventually when you say it, they should wee.

steppemum

Thank you very much for the advice, I'm not sure how the wee command will work as these two are cocking their legs every couple of minutes. Very rearly have I seen them stop and do a long pee. Funnily more liquid seems to come out of them than go into them . They also seen to like oering on each other, one will stop and sniff, the other will cock his leg and pee on the one that's sniffing head. They also seen to enjoy licking up other dogs pee as well - gross but they are dogs after all, oh and vomit if they find some, double gross.

My dogs get fewer and shorter walk in Summer because they don’t do well in the heat.

Winter doesn’t bother us.,

Those little wees are scent marking, they never do longer ones because they have such frequent walks.

How old are the DC? I would tell them you have read up and the new schedule you have decided is suitable for their needs and if ex doesn't like it she will have to rehome them. Start getting angry that the dog care is being used to bully and control you!

From your listed schedule change

6am - 5-10 minutes is plenty

Walk to school - great!

Drop lunchtime walk

DC home from school 20 minutes is essential

Then a longer walk at some point up to an hour. Unless this is last thing at night then they will need another 5-10 minute walk to pee.

Thank you very much for the advice, I'm not sure how the wee command will work as these two are cocking their legs every couple of minutes

I guess they are both dogs. My dog marks every few minutes. It's not a real wee. It's just weeing over other dogs wee to mark his spot. It's a dog thing.

My bitch needs to wee about every 5 or 6 hours throughout the day. They both hold it for 10 -12 hours overnight.

A walk in the morning, afternoon and evening just before bed is fine

Every time they do a wee, say ‘wee wee’ and give a treat. After about ten days you can say ‘wee wee’ and they’ll wee.

They will do scent marking wees, but do they do a big one when they’re bursting? Like first thing in the morning?

We use the phrase busy busy and it took a couple of weeks to train her as a 3 year old and she's not very bright when it comes to recognising verbal commands!

My ddog gets the same basic walks whatever the time of year.
8:30am 30 min walk on the school run
3pm 30 min walk on the school run
8pm 30 min walk including some off the lead time
I also let him sniff a lot on thr walk as it exercises his brain.
In the house we do about 20 mins training/brain exercises
In tje summer he may get walked more but thats because he comes with me if I fancy a nice walk or if the kids have a cricket match etc

Thank you every one for your advice this morning I've had my first "lie in" for months, 7:50 am I woke up , it got ti 8:45 and ddogs were still both asleep. I guess this is a bit more dog centric - ok at the weekends but they will have to fall in line for school work days. Also it seriously pissing down and the could both be pretending to avoid the heavy rain.

Another thing I've noticed since starting this thread is to take them on "smelly" walks, previously it was to a big open field where they would stand about a bit and then play fight. The appear to enjoy the nose down and track walks more, especially around pub and restaurant bins and bins in general. It appears that the long walks in big open spaces as instructed by the X was a bit wrong

They enjoy both for different reasons. Big open spaces are for chasing balls and/or other dogs.

Other walks definitely for smelling everything and hopefully scavenging some discarded food 🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

I guess this means they had managed to control their bladders overnight

Digs usually sleep for 20 hours per day...

Just wondering what actual breed the dogs are. Spitz isn’t a breed it’s a type and covers a variety of dogs from Akita’s and Huskies to much smaller toy Pomeranian or German Spitzer companion dogs.

I think if they are small and you don’t have a garden tbh you need lots of 5-10 minutes wee breaks outside just for a sniff and a few wees plus one longer walk of an hour or so a day and that’s ample. If they’re bigger breeds it would be considerably more and yes our dog (a medium to large breed) seemed to wee litres in comparison to her intake and a 5 minute walk for a last wee would mean at least 4 wee’s then could hold on for 12 hrs easily.

OP says 10kgs so fairly small rather than "working" type I would have thought?

OP that nearly 4 hours of waking or playing outside with the dog. That's not normal nor necessary. How do you manage 6:30-8:00 pm? Surely this is dinner/homework time?