How often do you really walk your dog?

[RedRobyn2021]

We have a small Labrador, a working lab type, she is 5yo and we live rurally. She's walked twice a day off lead about 35-40 minutes in the morning and then an hour in the afternoon (it would be less but I go with my 3yo daughter and it takes longer with her). Lots of ball, sniffing, chasing the occasional hare/deer/pheasant.

Mornings are a rush from the moment the alarm goes off at 6am as my DP has to be out to work for 7:50am. I do find it takes over our afternoons, I feel like I can't take DD to meet friends on afternoons because the dog has to be walked.

When I talk to friends or other people I know the general impression I get is that their dogs are only walked once a day (if they are lucky). Am I just making things harder for myself? I've taken DD out in all weathers (boiling sun, snow, rain, hail), even as a baby, to walk our dog.

Absolutely! Each dog breed, age, etc will have differing needs. I have active gundogs so I am aware I need to work their bodies and brains to their requirements. Once they're older that changes.

It's the same with feeding. Lots of people jump on the raw/grain free/fresh dog foods and actually you have to do what works for your dog, pocket and lifestyle. I know plenty of working dogs who've lived to ripe old ages fed on £30 a sack working dog kibble and some extras like eggs and veg on top so am quite cynical about the whole dog food industry!

I have a working x show spaniel cross who is quite high energy. He has the following set up:

Morning: 30-45 minutes on-lead walk
Lunchtime: Play in the garden with ball (10-15 minutes)
Evening: 60+ minutes including off leash. I bring a ball twice a week.

Twice a week he runs with me - minimum 5km. Today he will try his first ever 10km run :)

Weekends - long walks in new places and he comes everywhere with us!

We are married, no kids. I WFH so I'm able to take him out often.

@RedRobyn2021

She's on high performance working dog food. She generally hits 33kg in the Winter but 29/30kg the rest of the year.

She is living her best life! Farm dogs to play with, fields to sniff around, our DC to play with and plenty of scavenging when she can get away with it!

DH raced across a field last year thinking she had picked up a littered balloon...it was a dead frog! As she bit into it, it swelled up. 🤢🤢

A lab's best life! 😂

Springer Spaniel 3 years old
one walk for between half an hour to 2 hours depending on work, mostly off lead with some training as we go

Some days we miss walks because the weathers bad and she hates the rain 😂 fine by me!

I’m confident enough in their recall that they get offlead in a field next to a field of sheep, but I put them on lead to walk through it, or in areas with hill sheep where they’re not always in fields, cause I don’t feel any need to test whether they’d recall or not.

But my house is next to a farm, so I mean... they’re very used to stuff. Currently the
next field has goats and a pony in it, but it sometimes has cows or sheep.

I’ve had dogs I wouldn’t have offlead even in the next field and I’ve had dogs that could potentially catch wildlife, they didn’t get offlead in the same places the current ones can.

There’s chasing wildlife and there’s “chasing” wildlife - if mine want to run after something that’s full speed already an acre away and recall when I whistle, I don’t particularly see the need to worry about it tbh, but I’d still describe it as chasing if I was describing how their walk was. That’s the point I was trying to make about chasing is that some fogs just aren’t that good at it, so no harm done if they’ll come back.

Once a day. It used to be a one hour walk but it's reduced down to half an hour over the last year as his energy needs have been decreasing. 10.5 year old Staffy/Lab cross. All his walks are on lead as he's a restricted breed and those are the rules here (Ireland).

We have a big 0.4 acre garden so he's outside with the kids a lot too.

My lurcher isn’t interested in sheep or other livestock as he was well socialised around them when he was a pup - they don’t move fast enough to be much fun either, I expect. We’ve never encountered a deer but if we did he’d give chase given half the chance so I’d put him on a lead if we were anywhere heaving with deer. He’ll recall off a squirrel or a Rabbit though so I’m pretty sure he would off a deer, but I’m wouldn’t bet my life on it!

Yes absolutely should be on a lead, if that was a pregnant deer it would probably miscarry

An hour and a half in the morning (when we go for a run, both her and me), about four and a bit miles including at least a mile over the fields off lead. Then out for around ten to twenty minutes every couple of hours during the day when I'm at home (at the dog's insistence). If I'm out, then a half hour walk before I go and another twenty minutes when I get in (after which the 'every two hours' thing recommences).

Patterdale terrier, nine years old. Me - human, ageing rapidly.

Mine would never want to come home. Twice in seven years she's said enough now. I still wonder what the best thing to do is. She behaves the same in the evening whether she has an afternoon walk or not. She's eight in the summer and a golden retriever.

Keeprejoining I assume you either don't have a dog of any kind.
I'm pretty sure my dog hasn't bought deer close to extinction in this country because he chased one.
I could argue equally that your use of avocados is threatening the life cycle of a bee.
All living beings have a cause and effect.
Obviously I'm not suggesting that if my dog had caused a deer to have a miscarriage (highly unlikely because it was a stag) it would be a happenstance.
It would be very regretful.
But that's not a common occurrence.

Its not like we aren't in need of a hard cull of deer either. The damage they are doing to crops and wild areas alike is utterly devastating.
There's simply too many of them and no natural predators to keep them in check.

I agree. About the length of dog walking on Mumsnet.

It is a bit like 'how much do you have sex' threads...

Every time I read mn I read about dogs being walked for 2.5 plus hours every single day.

because if you know you’re not walking your dog enough, chances are you’re going to avoid threads asking the question

whereas if you’re happy with the walks your dog gets, you’ll be happy to comment

same with exercise

I don't know where Richmond park is but I live in Yorkshire and I see deer a lot near my house.

I don't let my dog chase them, i usually notice them before she does and I distract her until the deer notices me and a runs off. Sometimes the deer run, my dog sees and runs after them (not a chance of catching them) and I call her and she comes back.

I know people that shoot deer and eat them, so I hardly think what I described above is so terrible (that's not directed at you btw just in general as I saw one person do an actual angry face - ridiculous).

I would never let my dog off the lead around sheep.

That's quite a lot for a greyhound! Mine would protest! They're keen on their sniffaris aren't they...

We absolutely love venison, probably eat it more than beef.
That doesn't have any bearing on my dog chasing a deer on a woodland path.

Your dog walking approach sounds very sensible. The last thing I need are two dogs that are fitter than Olympic rowers. I aim for healthy, slim and chilled.

We also have 2 working line Labs. They get three pack walks a week (2.5 hours each) with their gundog trainer, after which they are bushed for the day.

When DH works from home they get a morning fields walk of 45 minutes to an hour. The same at weekends, and sometimes a very long day out walking, go to the pub or church, a day in London (they love a Regent’s Park trip) or on a kayak.

We absolutely do not walk them off lead around sheep. There is a huge deer and hare population locally (including one who’s moved into our paddock) which they half heartedly might chase but I can’t imagine they’ll ever catch one.

We have a large garden which they can tear about, should they wish. The little one spends hours out there at the moment, just sniffing around, which I remember the older dog doing as a pup too. Can’t be doing with night time ‘toilet walks’- that’s what the shrubbery is for!

While they know they have a routine, they are very adaptable. If today is a rare no-walk day, they’ll get the message, look a bit disappointed and then take to the sofa for the next 21 hours.

We regularly break many of the MN rules of dog ownership. No teeth cleaning, leave them hole alone for half. A day (or a day if the cleaner lets them out for a wee), no brain games, lots of human leftovers for dinner. They seem to be thriving though.

You’re right, I got a broken one. He also enjoys walking in the pissing rain! All the greyhound FB groups assured me that he wouldn’t budge out of the door if it were raining. My bit didn’t get that memo! But he’s gorgeous, so I forgive him. 🤣

You're joking right? Sheep run all the time!

14yo Lhasa Apso we go every day unless it's really hot or there is a full day of torrential rain. We go for about 45 minutes, maybe an hour some days. She likes to sniff so it's more of a stroll than a hike. She has recently dropped her evening walk but maybe with the light nights her interest will return. She doesn't like walking in the dark so I think that explains the lack of interest.

Sheep definitely run. I used to live on a sheep farm, it’s pretty much the essence of working a sheep dog to herd a flock up, that the sheep will run. Even my fat spaniel puppy had a go at chasing a sheep when she was young.

Thankfully we had enough sheep on hand to be able to train her out of it and she now won’t even look at a sheep 😁. I can walk her through MILs sheep field off lead and she stays to heel but we often have issues with random dogs chasing sheep.

And sheep especially run to get away from dogs! Although once my miniature dachshund managed to get himself chased around a field by a flock of sheep which was quite something.

🤣

i think sheep only run if chased but i can expect to be corrected.
my dog is on a lead anyway, perhaps the sheep i walk through are less afraid as i walk on a public foot path and my dog is small.