I was wondering how long i should take my 12 week puppy Buddy out for a walk? He is full of energy, I have heard from other dog owners that it should be 5 minutes for each month that are born, is this correct? If it is it doesn't seem much for him. Should I be taking him out twice or three times a day too?
At 12 weeks old, I was taking my girl out as follows: On lead walk to field (about 5-10 mins) Off lead playing (for up to 30 mins) I let her sniff a lot and got her to chase me and called her between myself and my daughter to practice recall. She spent a lot of time stopping and sniffing at her pace. On lead walk back home (5-10 minutes) The recommendation, the way I see it, means on lead when they have to walk at a constant pace. It's about managing their joints Hope this helps a bit
I wonder the same thing. My Beazley is 11 weeks old and we walk twice daily. In the morning for about 10-15 minutes and in the afternoon for about 10-15 minutes. I'm not sure the distance. I'll have to measure it his evening when I get home. The intent is to get her and I out for exercise but I surely don't want to create any joint problems for her.
I read a couple of versions but the one that made most sense to me, and I followed it loosely, was: 5 minutes per month of age of forced exercise allowed twice a day. "Forced" being anything - and/or -on leash, straight path, constant pace, constant speed, hard surface. Free play where puppy can stop, turn, slow, speed on a soft surface unlimited. This being kinder to soft, young joints. Oban was not on leashed walks at all till 18 weeks old. He was off leash but still we sometimes cut it short in cold, on straight hard packed snowmobile trails. AND I found he had no idea when to stop himself so free play was monitored too.
Everybody's going to have a different answer for this! At 12 weeks I was just doing off lead work, with a tiny bit of leash practice. We didn't have a safe garden at the time, so it was off to a quiet field or an empty school and then maybe 20 mins of me wandering around in circles and clicking/treating every time she was in my zone. I've loosely followed the 5 minute rule for off lead since then, and then I started introducing a short evening lead walk at about 16 weeks. The important thing is to be sensible, you don't want to push their little bodies too hard when they're young and then risk joint issues when they're older. Although a lot of people think the 5 minute rule is rubbish, it really helped me be aware of how long I was "out" with Xena. It's easy to lose track of time when you're alone with your dog in the bush!
I think lead walking in moderation - I'd say no more than 100 - 200m of learning how to walk on a lead is appropriate for a 12 week old puppy. Apart from that, I'd say exploring off lead at his own pace in very gentle ground is ok and doesn't really need to be restricted. Crashing around madly over excited is bad though. More important, I think is: no fetch or ball games (just roll balls around gently for fun), tug toys kept very low and puppy does the tugging, no playing roughly with larger dogs, no jumping (up or down), no slippery surfaces, no directed running.
My guy is 12 weeks and Ive been taking him on 10-15m walks since he was 8 weeks. We generally go for about 20m walks now. I use a long lead (20ft) and just let him run around me sniffing and doing what he likes the entire way. Sometimes I will go out to a dog park and let him run freely but I usually only have time for that on the weekends. I live in the suburbs so I dont have many options of just letting him run around. Hopefully there isnt any worry of joint issues. Nothing ive done is forced and I let him walk on the grass as much as possible. Honestly, Im more worried about how he just runs downs the stairs and launches off the third step after me!
Thanks for the advice, Buddy is mostly off the lead, we walk about 10-15 minutes on the lead. It's quite difficult to stick to the time limit as he enjoys being out. ☺
