Can a walk be ...

[EnglishScot]

An hour in the park throwing a ball rather than plodding along for an hour?

Can you tell I don’t have a dog

Really bad for dogs. Ball throwing can hype them up and long term can lead to arthritis.

My ddog loves a play in the park with a ball. We do wander around the park and throw the ball a few times, wander a little further and throw again - it’s not me throwing and him constantly retrieving for an hour as that’s too tiring.

My dog walks sideways in front of me the WHOLE time on a walk, waiting for me to throw the ball. It is her absolute favourite thing in the world. And it keeps her with me.

I am aware that it puts stress on her joints but she lives for retrieving, and frankly to take that joy away from her would be too sad for both of us. She is 8 and in excellent health.

My dog couldn't give a toss about balls. So she would just look at me blankly if I tried to swap her walk for ball throwing.

My dog doesn't chase balls (but she loves her taggy toy at home). I didn't know that throwing a ball for a dog was bad!!

An hour of ball throwing? Yawn. I can manage about 5 minutes of that before I get bored.

Have you got plans to get a dog OP?

As a dog walker I would never encourage anyone to chuck a ball for a dog for that length of time. It's bad for several reasons:

• impact on joints - lots of running and sharp twists and turns to try and catch the ball
• some dogs become obsessed and won't do anything else - even sniff or pee - because they just want the ball
• it wires them up (adrenaline) and doesn't always help tire them out or calm them down
• dogs need a variety of walks with lots of things to do - so some days they should have slow, calm sniffy walks - other days they could swim, some days they could chase a ball for a bit but it should be mixed in with other activities too.

There's a midway between 'plodding' along for an hour and throwing a ball for an hour.

Letting a dog chase a ball for an hour probably isn't a good idea as such intense repeated behaviour is a strain on the dogs joints and not good for the teeth if the dog is catching the ball in his mouth.

Walks aren't just 'plodding'.

Walks should involve elements of training, running, walking, sniffing, discovering and so on, and in the right environment might involve a bit of ball chasing.

We do a beach walk with lots of ball throwing but we only do it about once a week. Main reason is because it's not good for dogs joints plus I don't thinks really enough stimulation for a dog. Better to do a variety of walks, swimming, ball chucking, sniffing walks etc

Um... an hour of walking is way more interesting than an hour in a park - I don’t mean for the dog btw, some dogs would be happy for all exercise to be ball throwing despite it being terrible for their joints, but it’s not the most fun thing to do with them, it gets boring after about 5 minutes.

My dog’s attitude to ball throwing is ‘you threw it, you fetch it’.