This morning, after Callie went pee & pooh in the side yard, she came racing back inside the house to grab a small stuffed toy that looks sort of like a star-fish. Then she raced back to the side yard and threw the toy around a few times. Then she raced back inside. Then she raced back out again. She threw the toy a few more times, and then she repeated the whole thing for about four minutes.
The message? “I’m feeling cooped up, and I really need some exercise.”
Understanding your dog isn’t just a matter of reading it’s body language. Sometimes you have to interpret its actions. And then, sometimes, you have to act on the message.
Barbara and I learned the importance of giving your dog good exercise when we owned Bonnie (short for Bonfire because of her coloring), the super-hyper Irish Setter. Bonfire was going crazy all the time. Finally, Barbara, who was not a runner at the time, decided to take Bonnie for a thirty-minute run every morning. This was enough to calm her down every day, and Bonnie became a (relatively) mellow dog.
And Barbara went on to run nine marathons, including New York and London (twice).
One of the reasons Jamie (“My Doggie Says…: Messages from Jamie. How a dog named Jamie “talks” to her people”) was so mellow is that we ran about three miles with her almost every day. This wasn’t enough to totally tire her out, but she was very content the rest of the day.
When people tell me their dog is chewing the furniture or digging holes in the back yard, my response is, “How much exercise does the dog get?” As you might expect, the worst offenders are the ones that don’t get much exercise.
How is your dog telling you, “Hey, I need some exercise!”?
