As a teen I believed that exercising a hyperactive dog was the only way to live in peace with high energy dogs. This was a common belief at the time, which still appears today.
Fortunately, I learned a better way. I will share three of my top tips for living in peace with hyperactive dogs below.
But first, let me give you an example of how much exercise some high energy dogs can require. This is an example of the exercise my first dog, Alison, a red cloud Australian Kelpie use to get. This was the day that I first gave the amount of exercise Alison was getting serious thought.
On this particular day, Alison and I walked 5 km from home to the place my horse was kept. Once we arrived at the agistment Alison ran around while I caught, groomed and saddled my horse (approximately 30 mins). She then joined me for a 10 km bush ride at a trot and canter up and down hills.
After the ride she ran around the agistment again while I finished with the horses, about another 30 minutes. Then we walked the 5 km home. Once home Alison’s exercise didn’t stop – she raced around the front and backyard several times. My guess is Alison had done at least 25 km of exercise (most of it faster than a walk) that day.
Just writing this makes me feel exhausted and highlights one of the down sides of relying on physical exercise to calm down a hyperactive dog – the dog becomes fitter. Which means, as your dog becomes fitter, you need to exercise your dog longer or harder to tire them out. There are other problems with giving high energy dogs a lot of exercise, but that is a topic for another blog post.
What are my top tips for living with high energy dogs?
Reward calm behaviour
One of the best things we can do to make living with a hyperactive dog easier is to reward our dog for calm behaviour. For example, if your hyperactive dog is actually laying down, reward her calmly. This reward may be in the form of calm verbal praise, in some cases a low value treats or short calm massaging touch. Read this blog post to learn how to tell if your dog likes to be touched.
Choose a reward that does not amp up your dog, you want to keep them calm while reinforcing their calm behaviour. If touch or treats excite your dog then don’t use these reinforcers to reward calm behaviour. To find out if your dog likes your dog is enjoying your touch read this blog post.
Mental exercise
Right up there with reinforcing calm behaviour is mental exercise. Think back to a time when you were studying for an exam. On those days you may not have been physically active yet you probably felt very tired after studying. Mental exercise can be just as or more tiring than physical exercise.
How do we mentally exercise hyperactive dogs?
My favourite way is ‘clicker’ training. This type of training encourages your dog to think and problem solve. They need to figure out what they need to do to earn the ‘click’ and the treat.
Keep these sessions short at first (no more than 5 minutes) and marvel at how often your dog will rest after a training session like this.
Another way is to give your dog a puzzle to solve. This could be a food puzzle like the Classic Kong, Kong Wobbler, Kong Genius, DOY dog puzzle or Nina Ottosson puzzles. These puzzles challenge your dog to work out how to reach the food.
We need to stay calm
My third tip is to stay calm and relaxed around our high energy dogs. High energy dogs can become very excited by high pitched voices and sudden, jerky or random movements.
Even though it can be difficult at the time, the calmer and more relaxed we are the easier it will be for our hyperactive dogs to calm down. Later we can train these dogs to stay relaxed at times when we or others in the house are more energetic.
