Owning a dog is a big responsibility and something that shouldn’t be taken on light-heartedly. Daily walks are a must to keep your dog healthy both physically and mentally.
This can become challenging as your family and job responsibilities change over time. It can also be challenging if you live in a cold wet part of the world where going outdoors frequently isn’t a very enticing prospect!
Fortunately we’ve put together four great hacks which you can employ to make sure that your dog gets loads of exercise without having to use up all of your spare time!
Use Your Stairs
A house with stairs is a great asset for exercising your dog. Running up and down stairs is a massive calorie burner. A 160lb person running up and down stairs for ten minutes will burn 191 calories, so you can imagine this would also make a great workout for your dog.
All you need is a tennis ball and a dog who loves fetch, ten minutes of running up the stairs chasing the ball will give even the most energetic of dogs a fantastic workout with health benefits that will far outweigh the average stroll!
Use Technology
There are some great pieces of tech available these days which can help you in your quest to exercise your dog.
One particularly exciting piece of machinery is the automatic dog ball launching machine this (as the name suggests) takes the arm work out of fetch by automatically throwing your dog’s ball for you.
There are quite a few different models available but all of them will require a certain amount of training to teach your dog how to return the ball to the correct place so that the ball can be launched again.
If you have a bit of garden space or a nice corridor then once your dog has got the hang of it you can set this up and leave your dog playing with it for hours if necessary, giving them the equivalent of a full day of walks!
Tug Of War
Most dogs love a good game of tug of war, give them a bit of rope, keep hold of one end and let them do the rest!
Providing your dog is relatively small then you can do happily do this while sat on the sofa watching TV, the minimum effort for you and a great full body strength workout for your dog! BE careful with this one if your dog is a bit bigger though as it can end up being just as much of a workout for you too!
Do be careful when playing tug of war with your dog though as it can damage your dogs teeth and it also encourages your dog to behave more aggressively so if you do not completely trust your dog and do not have complete control over it then tug of war is best avoided, a few tips on how to play tug of war safely can be found here.
We hope you found some of these tips useful and that they help you to improve the quality of your dog’s life at times when it is tough to get outside!
Last Updated on 30/06/2019 by Karen Snow
Hi! I’m Karen and a certified dog lover. As a freelance writer and blogger, I do my best to squeeze in some time with my dogs, learning more about the way they act and how I can make sure that they continue to stay well-cared for by yours truly.
My dogs have helped me through a lot, and this is my way of giving back to them! Besides animals, I also love to travel and cook, having explored my country’s restaurants and unique places. Follow me as I show you all the amazing tips and bits of information I learn along the way about our furry friends!