What's in a Walk?

Aside from training, there are few better ways to improve your dog’s general behaviour, than the provision of regular opportunities to expend his energy through exercise.
 
Taking your dog for a daily walk, is a great way for you both to get out in the fresh air and spend some quality time together; it also offers the positive health benefits of regular exercise.
 
Walks with dogs can vary from off-lead romps through the local park, to simple lead walks through the streets. All types of walks offer ways for your dog to engage in natural behaviours that he will find enriching. Whichever type of walk you choose, you can be sure that there will be value in it from your dog’s perspective!
 
It is well known, that a dog’s sense of smell enables remarkable feats such as drug or cancer detection, and is actually thought to be more than 10,000 times more powerful than that of a human’s. As any dog owner will testify, use of this powerful sense is often displayed on walks, with the dog’s nose stuck to the ground following some secret, mysterious aroma!
 
Knowing how important the sense of smell is to dogs and seeing how much they enjoy a good old sniff, why not allow your dog’s next lead walk to include more of what he enjoys? If this means patiently waiting whilst your dog is glued to the spot sniffing a lamppost, then why not do just that? After all, your dog is simply fulfilling an instinctual urge to gain information from any previous dogs’ ‘pee mail’.
 
Allowing your dog to engage in this enriching behaviour, without constantly dragging him away, will provide increased mental stimulation and an additional outlet for his energy. It may even lead to a happier dog! ©