We continue the series of articles about walks with your dog. Today we will keep exploring the simple and at the same time profound question — how to make sure your walks bring benefit to your dog? If you missed the first part about the best gear to choose — read it here.
The hot topic of today is choice: do dogs need to make choices? How much is too much? And what does it have to do with walks?
Before we move on to practical tips, let’s start with some theory: having a sense of control over your life is one of the main pillars of psychological wellbeing.* This rule applies to all mammals, including humans and dogs — this is how our nervous system works.
In the modern world of pet ownership, we care a lot about our dog’s and others’ safety. Therefore, we limit our pets’ freedom. Often, we control their lives to a high degree. We decide what they eat, where they sleep, where they go, who they meet, the activities they do, even when they go to the toilet! And the list could go on. Some people train their dogs to obey their commands, others do not permit any kind of initiative. At the same time, we see many dogs struggle with anxiety, reactivity and fear (aggression is a fear response too!). We believe that it’s not a coincidence.
By limiting our dogs’ agency, we limit their ability to build resilience and cope with the world around them. From the very first days of the puppy, we want to dictate our human rules and forget to give them a chance to learn about the world on their own “doggy” terms. As a result, the world does not feel safe to them.
Allowing the dogs to make choices should not come at the expense of safety, however. Once we actively start thinking about it, we start seeing a thousand of small and big moments throughout our day when we can give our dog more space for choice-making. In this article we will focus on walks, because that’s the time our dogs get to explore the big wide world.
So, how to give your dog more choices and keep her safe at the same time?
- Gear — let your dog feel comfortable and be safe by choosing the right gear. A well-fitting harness will give true freedom of movement and a feeling of comfort. Discover more details in our article.
- More about a long line — it’s your key helper in allowing your dog to have more choices. If your dog has enough space, they will feel safer. Because they have more space to move away if needed, to approach something, and to use their body for communication more effectively.
For example, the lead length is often a key factor in dog reactivity and aggression. Dogs bound to a short leash do not feel safe, because they cannot effectively move away from a perceived danger, and start to protect themselves sooner. In addition, a dog on a short leash has less space to show polite body language, so their body appears more tense, which may trigger other dogs to be impolite too. Go for a simple line that’s no shorter than 3 meters / 10 feet. We have a perfect light line of 5 meters in our store.
- The direction — have you ever tried giving your dog an opportunity to choose the walk route? It’s very fun, we promise! Our dogs are more clever than what we usually give them credit for. Seeing them navigate the world, explore and make decisions is a wonderful way to ground yourself and tune into your dog’s perspective. If you worry about time or safety, plan ahead: pick a day when you do not have to hurry and a quieter time when you do not risk meeting any particular triggers. Giving the wheel to your dog for a part of the routine walk is also a great idea.
- Stopping and waiting — these are two simple things we often forget to do! So our dogs may learn to follow us and give their choices. Sniffing, peeing and leaving their scent are crucial natural behaviours for dogs, and we should absolutely allow them free choices of stopping to wee and what, how much and when to sniff. A bonus side effect is a calmer, more relaxed dog - did you know that sniffing brings their heart rate down? Sniffing is so important, in fact, that we dedicated a whole article to it — read here.
- Pace — slow down, especially if you have a smaller dog! Dog’s bodies are not made to maintain a constant high pace — they cannot lose heat as effectively as humans and quickly overheat. If you observe free-ranging dogs, you will notice that they run in short bursts, then slow down to cool themselves. Our dogs mimic our speed of walking, and tend to sacrifice their wellbeing to keep up with us. So next time you are outside, look at your dog — are they able to walk? Or are they having to constantly trot? Lower your pace until your dog can slow down enough to walk. This will also help your dog to feel better, more relaxed and have more time to make decisions.
- Learn canine body language — this probably should have been the first point on our list. Dogs are constantly expressing how they feel through their body language. Knowing what they say enables us to take better decisions for them, and understand their choices better. If you want a head start in learning the canine language, this book will guide you with simple language: “On Talking Terms With Dogs” by Turid Rugaas.
It’s never too late to start giving your dog more choices! If you share your life with a puppy, adult or a senior dog, all of them will equally benefit of having more choices in their lives.
Read next:
Additional resources:
Nordic Education Center for Ethical Dog Training
*References:
- Leotti, LA, Iyengar, SS, and Ochsner, KN. Born to choose: the origins and value of the need for control. Trends Cogn Sci. (2010) 14:457–63. doi: 10.1016/j.tics.2010.08.001
- McMillan, Franklin D., ed. Mental health and well-being in animals. CABI, 2019.
- Leotti, LA, and Delgado, MR. The inherent reward of choice. Psychol Sci. (2011) 22:1310–8. doi: 10.1177/0956797611417005
- Špinka, M. Animal agency, animal awareness and animal welfare. Anim Welf. (2019) 28:11–20. doi: 10.7120/09627286.28.1.011
- And many more! Discover the whole body of research on choices and welfare by using the Google Scholar.