Historically, these dogs were designed to work within communities, herding sheep, and hunting and now, they’ve pretty much lost their jobs.
You have to give your dog something to do.
Hire a Professional Dog Walker
Hire a Professional Dog Walker to take them on different routes and up hills for 2 hours daily.
Book them into Day Care once a week
Getting your dog to enjoy rowdy play at Doggy Day Care with similar breed, size, and temperament dogs will surely wear them out.
Try Treat Puzzles, and Enrichment Toys
Toys where dogs have to work for a reward are a great way to keep them occupied. Homemade or Store sold, Kong Wobblers, Treat Puzzles, Snufflemats, Kibble Balls, Automatic Ball Throwers are all great toys. Some trainers also recommend to “throw out their dog bowl” and to place a dog’s bowl portion of kibble inside these enrichment toys.
Join a Lure Coursing Club
If you’ve never heard of lure coursing, it is when a plastic bag, or soft toy is attached to a line on a pulley with a motor across in usually a large square a field for dogs to chase.
Try Nose Work Groups
If your dog is hard to control in public because they’re always following their nose, you might try nose work obstacle courses. Nosework is a great activity created to mimic professional detection dog tasks. One dog and one handler form a team. The dog must find a hidden target odor, ignor any distractors, and alert their handler. After the dog finds the odour they are rewarded with food or a toy.
Daily Trips to the Dog Park
You need to actively supervise your dog for their safety and other dogs as these places are a hot spot for dog fights.
Head to an empty open field
Kick a soccer ball around, throw a frisbee, or catapult a tennis ball with a chuck it thrower or use a Nerf Gun to shoot toys into the air across a long distance.
Play Fetch – but on a Hill
Having to run up inclines will get their heart and lungs pumping, helping to wear them out faster.
Try Dock Diving
This is a great sport for you and your dog to have fun. Dock diving is a dog sport where you toss a toy into a pool, and your dog leaps from a dock to retrieve it. Dogs can compete in jumping for distance or height from a dock into a pool.
Take them to the Beach
There are many beautiful dog friendly beaches across Australia. Running through soft sand and wading through water to go after a ball or a stick will help tire them out.
Take them Hiking
There are lots of great hiking spots across Australia, but don’t take your dog to a National Park, as Dogs aren’t allowed. So do your research before you go.
Try Dog Agility
Dog agility is a sport in which a handler directs a dog through an obstacle course in a race with the goal to make the fastest time with the most accuracy. Dogs run off leash with no food or toys as incentives, and the handler is not allowed to touch the dog or the obstacles.
Urban Mushing
Urban mushing is a sport where your dog helps pull you forward, usually done on foot, on a bike, on a scooter, or in a cart.
Give them their jobs back.
If you’re not sure what kind of activities to try, ask your dog what she wants. They’ve probably been telling you all along.
Behavior modification is often about getting dogs to stop acting like dogs but sometimes, we should just let our dogs enjoy being dogs!
What breed of high energy dog have you got? Comment below.
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