Exercising Puppies

I have been reading the other threads relating to exercise and HD etc with interest. Of course my pup is only 7 months and a large breed, so although I would like to do sports with her, I am happy ( of course ) to wait until she is about 2. Just wanted to hear people's thoughts on free (off lead) exercise and running.

I am a dog walker and now due to the loss of two clients (Ellie rehomed and another one fighting) I only do one walk per day. We go to the beach or country park etc. in the car and then I let them play for about 1 hour before heading back. We don't walk to our destinations as Rio is too young for much lead walking. I walk around when we get there, but mostly to stop me from freezing! I lift Rio in and out of the car (increasingly difficult!), BUT what I wanted to ask was - do you think that an hour free play with other dogs is too much?

Personally, no...

I let Max and Murphy play as much as they wanted when Murphy was little. Sometimes it was 10 minutes, sometimes they would run round like loonies for hours (they still do).

If she is tired, I suspect she'll come back to you, or sit/lay and rest. As long as she isn't going absolutely mental, I wouldn't worry.

Thanks. I'm not really concerned but I would like to hear other people's views. I was told by someone that in his opinion no dogs should play off lead under a year old. Sounds like overkill to me and I can't begin to imagine teaching recall to a teenage dog! But hey...

I have to admit the rotties did a lot of free play as pups, but when you have as many dogs as I did then, they would have needed to have spent large amounts of time crated, I found my pups would have a play then pop off to bed for a sleep, they didnt really over do things, x I think when you have lots of dogs about and play is on offer when pups want it, they self regulate,

This is something that we thought long and hard about with ours. We'd read all the advice about the '5 minute rule' and had planned to follow it. We'd also planned to keep her on lead (mainly out of fear of loosing her). Here's what our vet told us...

She said the '5 minute rule' for puppies is a myth perpetuated by breeders looking for a get out if a pup develops genetic problems. Healthy puppies will only benefit from natural exercise (by natural this just means letting them off lead and letting them run and play to their hearts content. She also insisted that a breed like a beagle (bred to run all day) NEEDS to get off lead every day. She said it's impossible to exercise them enough on lead.

A few months later I had a discussion with another vet and she clarified things further. She explained that in normal, healthy puppies it was in their best interests to let them run and play as nature intended. However, if a dog has HD (which isn't detectable until it's older) then it's possible that the wrong kind of exercise will make it worse. No one is really clear about what the 'wrong kind' of exercise is. Some say on-lead is harmful - other say off-lead is harmful.

Any breed of dog can develop symptomatic HD, but in some breeds it's common. She said it wasn't common in my breed so the risks of preventing natural development through play far outweighed the possible benefits if the dog did indeed have HD. But it's really for the individual owner to decide as no one can tell if your dog has the problem until it's older.

Both vets reassured me that it'd be very hard to damage a pups growth plates through exercise. Freak accidents can happen, but it's just as likely the pup will do something indoors.

With a large breed dog that's prone to HD it's a tough decision. If your dog has healthy hips then exercise will (I believe) do him good. However, if there's a good chance he has the genetic disorder then most people seem to think that too much exercise will make them worse. You have to decide whether to believe those that say too much onlead is bad or those that say too much offlead is bad.

For what it's worth, we took ours to hydrotherapy at a specialist vet centre. That way you're getting your dog's muscles built up without any pounding and it's all controlled by experts that know about HD and other conditions. They are also in a good position to advise you with regards to other activities that you want to try.

Hands up.....

I'm a control freak!

I do not allow my dogs to run about like idiots as pups. They have play time with the other for learning but I am very careful about not allowing them to go OTT.

I always advise people who come training that it is more important to teach a puppy to chill than to run it for hourss. Not many pet people waht a dog that will run from dawn to dusk every day or a dog who demands exercise at certain times. My dogs are more that capable of going all day if need be but they are also happy to have one 1/2 hour walk and then chilling for the rest of the day.

Just my thoughts.

Not according to the KC:

Puppies need much less exercise than fully-grown dogs. If you over-exercise a growing puppy you can overtire it and damage its developing joints, causing early arthritis. A good rule of thumb is a ratio of five minutes exercise per month of age (up to twice a day) until the puppy is fully grown, i.e. 15 minutes when three months old, 20 minutes when four months old etc. Once they are fully grown, they can go out for much longer

The 'myth' (according to my vet) is that exercise will harm healthy dogs.

She doesn't dispute that dogs with genetic disorders can be made worse by the wrong kind of exercise.

The KC know that there is a high incidence of genetic dissorders amongst pedigree dogs. It may seem to them that the most prudent advice is to tell everyone to stop exercising their dogs. That may well make it seem as if the HD problem in dogs is less serious as there will be less severity in symptoms.

My vets view differs in that she thinks that you have to do a risk assessment. Weigh up the odds of your particular dog developing symptomatic HD in it's lifetime and balance that against the harm done by limiting exercise and play. It's not just physical - some argue that other aspects of development, such as socialisation are affected if the dog can't play with others of it's kind.

An entirely separate issue that I have with the 'five minute rule' is that it doesn't take account of breed characteristics. For example, a 5 minute walk for a chiwawa is far more demanding than a 5 minute walk for a great dane due to difference in size. Then consider what the dog has been bred for - surely a husky need differing amounts of exercise as a pup than a greyhound. The husky might be required to run hundreds of mile in a day whereas the greyhound will only ever need to do short sprints. Puppy play is about preparation for adult life.

Yes you have to take individual breeds into account. I don't think people take the five minute rule as an exact science, timing each walk they take with their dog to the millisecond. That would be silly and takes the fun out of what should be a pleasurable activity. It is, however, a guideline and a very sensible one at that.

Restricting a growing puppies exercise doesn't come ONLY from the point of view of preventing the potential severity of hip dysplasia, should a pup be genetically disposed to it. There is far more too it then that. One of the main risks when over exercising a puppy is the potential for damage to the growth plates. Contrary to what some say, puppies won't always stop when tired. When my current dog was a puppy, if I had let him, he would of ran and played until he dropped dead from exhaustion.

If you push a young puppy past what it is physically capable of (VERY easily and innocently done by people believing that 'more is better') you increase the risk of damage to the growth plates and/or the growing bones. That of course can lead to growth and bone abnormalities.

The idea that you can damage growth plates easily is one that I've heard many experts dispute. As I've said, my own vets dispute it. But I guess it's one of those areas where you'll find experts arguing both sides.

So lets look at this from another angle...

If a puppy has an injury to a growth plate I believe that the bone will stop growing - or will grow abnormally? It's not just a case of the dog getting a bit stiff when it's 15 years old and it's owners saying "oh - he must have damaged a growth plate when he was little". It's a VERY serious problem.

We walk our dogs in the local parks and they have always played off-lead. We've gotten to know literally hundreds of dog owners fairly well and it's rare to find someone that doesn't have their dog off-lead as soon as it's had it's jabs. The dogs all run crazy as pups. Most of them do much less as adults. I have NEVER heard a report of someone's pup sustaining a growth plate injury. We constantly hear of cruciate ligament problems, elbow displasia, hip displasia in certain large breeds....but NEVER growth plate injury".

So my question would be (a rhetorical question) how common an occurrence is this? What percentage of dogs that are allowed to run free as pups and decide for themselves how much exercise they need end up with growth plate injuries. What percentage of pups with restricted exercise get growth plate injuries?You need to figure that into your risk analysis.