Walks are brilliant, super important parts of a dogs’ day as they get to sniff, socialise, learn and interact with lots of different things.
But this isn’t the only way we can entertain our dogs.
There are many scenarios where we may need to limit our dogs’ walks. After an operation, stormy days, super-hot days and currently during the COVID-19 lockdown.
This may mean we need to cut back on the duration of the walk, the location of the walk or the number of walks a day. All of these things don’t have to mean a bored dog!
The first thing we can look at is how we feed our dogs. food in a bowl? Not overly fun and enriching.
There are TONNES of different ways of feeding your dog:
1. Place a towel down flat and scatter some treats/dinner on it. then roll it up and see if your dog can use his nose to move the towel and find the treats! you can make it harder by rolling it tighter, or tying the ends up
2. Scatter feed by throwing his dinner on the grass in your garden. At least we have the perfect weather for this!
you can make it harder by scattering it further or hiding pieces around the garden
3. Puzzle feeders are also fab! As we are in lockdown you can make your own!
have a look through your recycling. If you have any boxes, use these to place his dinner in. you can shut the lid to make it harder.
4. Use empty drinks bottles. Place some dinner in and close the lid. Cut a hole in the side so he has to move it around to get the food out.
5. Scrunch up pieces of a newspaper with a few pieces of food in each one. You can either put these on the floor or in a box. You can make it harder by scrunching up the paper more tightly!
6. Licky mats are great if your dog is fed wet food!
7. You can also use food toys such as Kongs and dispensers.
Keep up the variety so your dog gets the most fun out of their mealtimes!
You can also have a go at some fun training. That trick you just haven’t gotten round to giving a go.. until now! Plenty of time!
Things you could have a go at training are:
1. Tricks. Spin, leg weaves, roll over, sad (which Archie is so kindly demonstrating in the pic!)… anything!
2. Scentwork. Dogs LOVE to use their nose, so give it a go by hiding some treats around your house and/or garden and see if your dog can find them. You can also hide toys and give them a good game once they have found it!
3. Obedience! Just because we can only go out once with our dog doesn’t mean we can’t incorporate some obedience training into this walk. Fed up of your dog dragging you down the road? Practice your loose-lead walking! Does he leg it every time you let him off at the park? Recall training time!
Training is a BRILLIANT way of knackering your dog out. Any of you who have taken your dog to a training class will know just how tired your dog is afterwards! Use this! If your dog is used to two walks a day, then do some training in the garden instead of the second walk!
Have a go! Your dog will thank you!
Drop me an email for more ideas or more in-depth plans on how to introduce any of the above!
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