Walking the dog is an essential part of any dog owner’s daily schedule. A daily walk gives your mutt a good exercise, and of course a good bathroom break as well. But besides that there is a reason why all dogs love to walk - It’s because of their natural instinct to walk and run. Just like birds need to fly and fish need to swim, dogs need to walk. In the wild, dog packs are up early just to walk and to find their food. They have 4 legs for a reason. In a dog pack, an alpha dog has to lead the way for all of the others to follow it. This instinct mimics a sort of migration effect for the dog. Heres why you need to walk your dog a bit more than you think you should.
1. Health
Walking your dog is good for both of your health. Not only will walking your dog make it active and agile, it will also make you get healthier, with regularly going for a morning jog in the park and a walk in the evening. Nobody likes to have a lazy and fat pet (unless you’re aiming to have a canine version of Garfield), and if you don’t take your dog for regular walks then it will slowly start to be a sedentary pet. Your dog will be more likely to get sick since it won’t be getting fresh air and exercise much, resulting in trips to the vet. If it becomes overweight then it will want more food as well, and that will make you spend more on pet food. A 20 minute walk twice a day is good enough for your pooch.
2. Walking maintains good behavior
Walking a dog releases most of its pent up energy. Otherwise you would notice it would start chewing on your furniture, or tearing up curtains and show erratic behavior if it’s always inside and has nothing to do. Although a walk in itself doesn’t prevent it from doing all these things, but taking its mind away from this, and providing it mental stimulation while its outside will most likely cause it to stop. Adding regular daily walks plus 2-3 additional hour long walks during the week can help curb this behavior, and also provide you time to train it various tricks. It also sees other dogs in the park, and its social skills are enhanced by interacting with other dogs. Animal researchers concluded that dogs that go on walks on a daily basis are less likely to be obsessive, destructive, and not have dominance or separation issues.
3. Walking the right way
There is a correct way to walk your dog, believe it or not. You pooch should not walk in front of you but only walk beside or behind you. This may seem as not a big deal to one but it is very much so in the canine world. Dogs are highly territorial creatures and so you have to train them first how to walk with you. If you let your dog it walk in front of you, then in dog lingo you are sending a message that he’s in charge of the walk and leading the way.