hiya people and pups!! Murphy is a week shy of being 5 months old, we have a good beach where we live and he loves to walk along it and run in and out of the sea we also have a run up and down the sand dunes, i know a lot of people say ise the rule of for every month have 5mins walk so this would only be 25 mins we are out at least a hour and then maybe a little walk round the local park later in the day, is this too much exercise??
I would just go careful, especially on the beach as, like us, sand is much harder to walk on for your joints. His joints are still developing so could be more fragile. I would probably do more brain work at home to tire him out rather than walking him as much.
I've search high and low and can find no scientific evidence to support the '5 minute rule'. The Kennel Club describes it as ' a rule of thumb' - which has a dictionary definition of 'A useful principle having wide application but not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable in every situation'. I found some interesting advice on a breeder's website regarding the '5 minute rule' 'Any sensible caring owner is going to be thinking about this issue having bought a puppy. A mixture of experiences from any previous dogs you have owned, coupled with breeder advice (or possibly lack of!), with a dash of scaremongering from well meaning ‘advisors’ may well have your head spinning on how much is too much? How much is not enough? Is I give my puppy too much am I causing it damage, and what’s the cutoff point for that ???? There is never going to be a definitive answer to this burning question. But, of course, there are sensible guidelines. The crux of the matter is, IF your puppy has sound genetically strong joints passed from its parents, and is not horribly overweight, in all honesty, it can take really quite a LOT of exercise without damage. However, how can we KNOW if it has sound joints? Well, hopefully, if you have done your homework, you will of bought from parents who both have at least been hip scored if not also elbow scored (although this is less common so don’t beat yourself up if one or both parents are not). In addition to BEING hip scored, hopefully both have GOOD hip scores, so therefore making buying from scored parents basically as worthwhile as possible. However its important to stress that doing so is you doing your very best to give yourself a head start in maximising the chance of your puppy having good strong genetically sound joints. It is not a guarantee of that, nature can be cruel and work in mysterious ways. However, the chances are stacked in your favour if your pups parents have good hip (and maybe elbow) scores. If they do not, then what this *means* is that if you are being sensible and realistic, you need to err on the side of caution and assume that possibly they have not, and therefore your puppy may of inherited some level of weakness. I am not saying at all that ANY young dog cannot have an accident or cause himself injury in a trip, fall, crash with another dog etc. But if they have genetically sound joints, the chances are they will ‘bounce back’ FAR more easily than if there is weakness there. Basically HEALTHY JOINTS ARE HARD TO DAMAGE, WEAK ONES ARE EXTREMELY EASY. However EITHER WAY, common sense is needed to be applied. The point being your puppy is a baby. Babies need to be taken care of because they cannot make rational decisions for themselves. They, like small children, run on adrenaline, especially during new and exciting experiences, and do not know ‘when to stop’. So YOU need to make that decision for them. As a young dog hits exhaustion point during exercise, damage can then start to occur pretty easily. Your puppy will not acknowledge he has hit exhaustion point. From his behaviour he may seem FULL of beans and up for it. Especially if interacting with other dogs. A puppy exercise guide, commonly considered helpful and useful, is called the 5 minute guide (or sometimes the 5 minute rule – but for me, there is no gun to anyones head on this, it is not a RULE, it is a helpful guide that owners should use as a ball park figure, NOT as something to set your watch by). The idea being that per MONTH of the pups life so far, 5 minutes of enforced exercise is given per DAY. So after puppy vaccinations are completed at about 12 weeks of age (so 3 months) (before which it is still VERY important to take your puppy out to introduce it to sights and smells, dogs, people, pushchairs, children, cars, buses and all sorts …. staying at home is NOT a sensible option in anyway….. See article: Keeping a Puppy home during its innoculations? ) you would allow 15 mins of enforced exercise. (3 months of age x 5 mins per month = 15 mins (or so!) of exercise. 4 months of age = 20 mins per day 5 months of age = 25 mins a day …. etc, up until about 11/12 months of age where upon the dog *should* be structurally less vunerable, any weaknesses will almost certainly have come to light if there ARE any lurking, and you pretty much have the green light to exercise your dog to your hearts (sensible!) content! What is ‘Enforced exercise’? Enforced exercise is NOT strolling or playing in the garden. It is not wandering about the house. It is exercise out on a walk, or hammering around training, where the puppy is away from home and either on OR off lead ‘out and about’. This is when basically the puppy is experiencing new environments, meeting other dogs and people and basically running on its adrenaline, or walking because you have decided its ‘time for a walk’. Around the house and garden, even if playing, at any point the puppy can decide ‘i’m tired, i’ve had enough, thanks’ and give up and flop down, put itself to bed or just lose interest and wander off. Basically a dog listening to its own body clock. Enforced exercise is when you have a puppy NOT able to listen to its own clock because new and exciting stuff is coming its way. * Again – this is a GUIDE. For a 4 month old dog, potentially ‘allowed’ 20 mins or so exercise, you may well find that 15 mins charging about with another young dog PLENTY before warning bells start to play in your mind that quite probably, enough is enough. However on or off a lead, going for a slow wander along a country path, stopping and sniffing here and there, meeting next to nobody and everything very calm and ‘non taxing’, half an hour would be just fine and non stressful. That amount of exercise per day can be split as you like. If your 6 month old gets 15 – 20 mins in the morning, and 15 – 20 mins in the afternoon, thats perfectly fine. If you only walk once a day, brilliant, put it all into one ‘hit’. Its a guide, take it, chew it over and work with it rather than feel ‘hemmed in’ by it. However it is proven a great guideline for our breed. The most common thing for someone with a lively young dog already, of maybe 5 or 6 months of age who have been giving it 45 mins or even an hours walk to ‘wear it out’, is to throw their hands up and say ’25 – 30 minutes???? A DAY???? How the HELL am I going to wear out Fluffy with THAT? He will go through the ceiling!! He has three times that and comes back bouncing!!’ So at the end of the day, it's a decision each of us has to make for our puppy on 'appropriate exercise' levels with half an eye to the future and healthy joints, which in any event can not be guaranteed even if parents have brilliant hip and elbow scores.
Here is a good, balanced article - I've followed the advice in it with all six of my pups. http://www.thelabradorsite.com/labrador-puppy-exercise-how-much-is-too-much/ "Young puppies need the time and space to run about freely, and free running exercise is beneficial. You do not need to attempt to prevent puppies playing in the garden, trotting about the house or playing with another young puppy for a while. Provided that the puppy is free to stop and rest whenever he wants. As far as we know at the moment, formal exercise – walking on a lead – for example, is probably best restricted using the five minute rule as an approximate guide. And strenuous exercise such as stair climbing, and chasing balls should be limited or avoided altogether in puppies under three months of age. Remember, an adult dog can become an amazing athlete, but like all athletes, fitness and stamina are best built up in gentle stages if injury is to be avoided."
Formal exercise, walking on a lead, is considered to need restriction, according to the info posted on this website (and other places I've read), yet free running and playing with other pups/dogs is considered to be of less concern? It might be staring me in the face, but I don't understand this. If I walk my pup to the park, or round the block, or up and down local streets on a training 'on lead' walk she isn't jerking, racing, stopping and starting, changing direction, etc in the way she would if running about with another dog at the park. That strikes me as more damaging for her joints. I generally abide by the rules but I don't really understand them! My vet told me the five minute rule is an inexact science but to broadly stick to it but that I can take her out as many times as I like using the 5 minute rule. The veterinary nurse however, said strictly 5 minute rule and no more than twice a day, as did someone I spoke to from Labrador rescue! The vet also said be very cautious with chasing balls. I like the info posted by @Jojo83 which gives a balanced view. But I still find myself worrying constantly about doing the right and wrong thing.
You are not alone, I think we all do, Hattie was our first dog, I worried and I did stick to the 5 minute rule just to be on the safe side. Hattie was walked a little on pavement until we reached the fields and then off lead and home. Over 18 months or so I slowly built up her exercise time. I am glad I did as she is almost 9.5 years old and has never had any health issues, joints or otherwise. She is infact as fit as a butchers dog and still walks, trains and runs with her doggy pals for 2 hours per day leaving all the youngsters eating her dust Do what you think is best for your puppy there's really no hurry and a little less pressure on young puppy joints, avoiding injury surely has to be the safest way to go. x
It's because, when the dog isn't choosing their own pace and is forced to walk at your pace, it puts a lot of pressure on the joints. Do you ever feel achy after spending hours walking slowly around shops, or at a museum? If you'd walked the same distance at a normal pace, you'd feel a lot less achy. It's the same thing. They also can't choose to have a break if they're on lead - or even off-lead and following you on a walk. You still need to use common sense when they're playing with other dogs because sometimes they won't take a break then, either. If that's your dog, you need to give them enforced rest every now and again. I do tend to take Luna out for longer than the five-minute rule, but spend a lot of time sitting or standing around to give her a rest from walking. I'm also careful about the terrain she walks on, as we have very steep hills here I don't want her to run up and down. We don't have a garden here in Andorra, so I think it's good for her to have more time outside.
It is so confusing @Plum's mum particularly when you don't get consistent advice at your vet's practice. I remember my girl's breeder recomending that exercise should be restricted to 30 minutes a day until 12 months old site different yet again. In the end I didn't work so much on time but on distance that I intended to cover on a walk and all walks are at pup's pace whether on or off lead, not mine. Decide what you feel comfortable with and that works for you and your pup and then try and relax. As a child our family dogs weren't subjected to a 5 minute exercise rule and neither have my earlier pups and they all managed to survive without major mishap.
With Betsy as a pup, I let her exercise as much as she wanted off lead - BUT that was off lead, on her own, noodling about in woodland with me wandering along, sitting down on benches, taking it at her pace. Not charging about playing with other dogs or anything else where her adrenaline was dictating the pace she moved at. I was pretty strict on the 'enforced exercise' thing - e.g. lead walking, walking at heel, recalls, retrieving and so on. Anything where I dictated the pace, I stuck to the 5 minute rule. And I considered that per day, not twice a day. I think the confusion mainly comes in with people not appreciating that lead walking, chasing balls, and so on is dictated by the human and it is very, very easy to over exercise an enthusiastic puppy like this.
