How to Get Your Pet to Lose Weight and Be Fit

Healthy exercise engages both the brain and the body. When designing an exercise plan for your dog, be mindful of the types of behaviors that you expect from your dog as part of your family. Combining exercise with learning not only adds meaning and interest to the exercise, but also reduces the risk of injury to your dog.

Avoid The Excessive

Excessive or inappropriate exercise can damage a dog’s mind and body. For example, jumping high in the air to catch a ball or Frisbee and then landing awkwardly can cause significant knee injury that may require surgery. More is not better when it comes to uncontrolled or wild canine exercise.

The basic structure of an exercise session can be applied to most dogs with adjustments made based on the physical condition of the dog.

How To Begin

Regardless of your dog’s fitness level, always start with a physical warm up that is related to the activity in which your dog is going to participate. Including mental control during the warm up period allows your dog to become more focused on you and the task at hand (or paw).

If you run with your dog, for example, warm your dog up with a 5-10 minute walk. During the walk, teach your dog to ‘heal’ or to sit and wait at street corners, et cetera, so that you incorporate mental activity with the physical warm up. After a warm up period of approximately 5-10 minutes, your dog can then move into the ‘strenuous’ part of their workout.

How Long to Exercise

The fitness level of your dog not only determines the type of strenuous exercise but the duration as well. For a less fit or older dog, a longer warm up period with a shorter strenuous exercise session is more appropriate. For a dog that has never exercised, or has a condition that does not allow for a high level of activity, the mental and physical warm up session alone may be ideal.

Regardless of your dog’s fitness level, alternating mental tasks with strenuous activity enables your dog to “think and move” at the level necessary to sustain your dog’s daily activities.

Cooling Down

At the conclusion of your dog’s strenuous exercise session, cool down your dog physically with gentle exercise (such as a slow walk) and mentally by spending some pleasant and calm time with your dog. It is very difficult for a dog to suddenly shut down after building a high level of excitement.  Teach your dog how to smoothly shift gears to avoid behavior problems that can ensue from an excited dog suddenly left alone to his own devices.

For a dog in any physical condition or stage of life, participating in regular appropriate exercise with their ‘human’ is part of a fulfilling life.  Setting time aside to enjoy your dog helps both you and your dog stay emotionally and physically healthy.