Social Walks
It is no secret that dogs are highly social beings. While dogs enjoy company of humans, it's very important for them to spend quality time with their own species as well.
How can we help our dogs have truly quality time together with other dogs and ensure the experience is enjoyable for everyone?
We invite you to try taking your dog on a social walk. Such walks are a great opportunity for calm and pleasant interaction for dogs of all sizes and ages, including ones that are shy, fearful or get excited too easily in presence of other dogs.
Social walks can be done on or off leash. We just need to make sure everyone is safe and comfortable.
Everyone keeps a comfortable distance
Typically, during a social walk, people and dogs walk slowly with a little distance from each other. The distance can be a little bigger in the beginning to allow dogs time to calmly observe and get to know each other. Remember: dogs are great in communicating with their body language and can do it at a distance too.
Later on the distance can be shorter if all dogs are comfortable with it.
When dogs are calm and enjoying the social walk, they can walk closer and closer together
Providing our dogs with calm social opportunities not only teaches them a valuable lesson of remaining calm in the presence of other dogs, but also improves their wellbeing in the long run, since being social is an essential part of being a dog.
Our mentor and teacher Turid Rugaas has recently written a detailed article about Social walks, in which you will find more useful tips. The link to Turid's article is:
A lovely social walk in the snow
