HOW HARD CAN IT BE TO WALK A DOG?

By Lynn Veale 

Giving your dog the proper exercise is among the most important aspects of dog ownership.  One of the easiest ways to exercise your dog is to take him for a walk.  Our neighborhood is filled with people who take their dogs for daily walks.  A few will jog and a few will ride their bicycles with the dog running beside, but most people will just walk.  Although walking a dog sounds like an easy task, for a guide dog puppy raiser it is far more complex than it looks.

Sometimes when I see people walking their dog, it is difficult to tell who is walking whom.  Very often the owner is being dragged along as the pet is walking out in front, pulling on the end of its leash.  A guide dog and its partner are a team that have learned well how to work together.  The love, trust, and cohesiveness in that relationship is essential to the two working together as though they are dance partners in a waltz.  For the working guide dog, learning to love, trust, and be part of a team begins in puppyhood.  It begins on walks with its raiser.  A guide dog puppy in training should not be pulling ahead on its leash, nor should it be dragging behind, forcing the raiser to pull it along.  A guide dog puppy in training should be walking beside its raiser in the place where you would find a best friend, a companion, a partner.

Renata explores the backyard.

Building a guide dog puppy’s confidence is an ongoing process.  The daily walk is an important instrument used to develop that confidence as well as develop other skills the puppy will need later in life.  One of the most crucial skills for a guide dog is learning how to ignore.  The daily walk has an infinite number of distractions that a guide dog puppy in training must learn to ignore. 

Teaching a guide dog puppy to walk down the street with confidence, purpose, grace, and manners begins at four months of age, after it has received all of its shots.  Prior to that, walking on a leash is practiced in the house or backyard.  Teaching a puppy to walk on a leash without pulling is no easy task and is accomplished through patience and daily practice.  When the puppy is allowed to go on walks through the neighborhood, distractions become an integral part of the training process.  Some puppies are so overwhelmed by their first few exposures to these distractions that it is best to let the puppy just sit and watch the world go by.  After the shelter of a loving home for the first few months of its life the sights, scents, and sounds of the outside world can be quite intimidating for a young puppy that is just learning there is a whole different environment that exists outside the front door of its home.

Although many people might think distractions are limited to cats and other dogs, a guide dog puppy raiser can tell you that there are many more distractions that his or her dog must learn to contend with.  For example, traffic of all kinds is a big distraction and one of the larger issues we must deal with on our daily walks.  Although guide dog puppies in training will quickly learn not to pay attention to the cars that occasionally travel down the street at the posted 25 mph speed limit, they have a harder time ignoring those same cars on streets with an increased speed limit.  And a harder time still when those cars are coming at them from behind.  And yet a harder time still when a loud, rumbling motorcycle or huge work truck is coming at them from behind on a 50 mph road and blows its horn as it drives by.  A guide dog puppy must learn to override its natural instinct to run when it hears a dump truck roaring in the road just behind him.  Bicycles and skateboards are much quieter, but present their own problems.  Sometimes a bicycle can approach from behind so quietly that my puppy will not hear it until it is directly beside us.  Although my puppy will sometimes startle when he realizes the bicyclist is there, the goal is to have him be more aware and not startle.  Skateboards are noisier than bicycles and share the sidewalks with us, bringing them in very close proximity to the puppy.  The puppy needs to recognize what a skateboard is and how to ignore it, as well as strollers, wheel chairs, scooters, and people on roller blades.

Another issue guide dog puppies must learn to deal with on a walk is other dogs.  It is essential that a working guide be focused on his job of getting his partner from point A to point B without stopping to socialize or chat with the other dogs he sees along the way.  It is difficult for a guide dog puppy to learn that he is “on the job” and now is not the time to socialize, but it can be done.  With patience, perseverance, and lots of encouragement a guide dog puppy can be taught to keep walking and not reach out to greet a four footed friend, even if that friend is reaching out to greet him.  In addition, he must learn to ignore the scents of other dogs that usually mark his path and definitely to not do any marking himself! 

Although dogs are the most frequently encountered animal on our daily walks, a guide dog puppy must learn to ignore all animals that cross its path whether domestic or wildlife.  Blowing leaves is another distraction our puppies must ignore, as well as blowing trash, flying insects, creepy crawlies, dropped bits of food, scents on the wind, people whistling to get the puppy’s attention, and people trying to pet them as they walk past.  Guide dog puppies are taught to go potty on command, but they are also taught not to go potty on a walk.  They are taught to hold it until they get home.

Gary's first walk in the snow.

 In addition to distractions, guide dog puppies must learn how to deal with different textures on their walks.  Whenever I see a change of texture for my puppy to experience I will take advantage of it.  The more my puppy experiences the different textures, the more he learns it is nothing to be surprised about and the more he will ignore those changes in texture.  Grass, gravel, manhole covers, grates, and wood chips feel very differently to a dog’s paws than pavement.  I have raised seven guide dog puppies and every one of them has immediately gone into “play mode” the first time they felt sand beneath their feet!  Walking in sand seems to make the dogs happy and joyous and creates the biggest challenge for me in teaching my puppies to ignore the feel of the surface on which they are walking.  Temperature changes present similar challenges.  Walking through puddles, rain, or snow will sometimes bring an unexpected reaction from my puppy, but the more my puppy is allowed to experience such changes, the calmer he will become when feeling those different temperatures.

 Since we live in the desert, the members of Phoenix Guide Dog Raisers must pay particular attention to the sidewalk temperatures when we walk our dogs.  The pavement in the summer can get extremely hot and can hold that heat until well after the sun goes down.  To prevent scorched paws, our summertime walks must take place in the early morning, late at night, or in an air conditioned building, such as a mall.  Even in spring or fall when the pavement temperatures are cool enough to walk the puppies, the blacktop parking lots and metal manhole covers may be too hot for a dog to walk on.  At all times we must be very cognizant of the surface temperatures our puppies are experiencing.

 The concept of walking a dog seems simple, but if that dog is to become a working guide many factors keep the experience from being an easy, mindless stroll.  Distractions on every walk are numerous, unavoidable, and absolutely essential to teaching a guide dog puppy how to become a focused team member with the grace of a perfectly synchronized dance partner.