I will soon be able to walk my puppy for the first time - a german shepherd. I know that the general rule of thumb is 5 minutes for every month of life. However, if at 3 months, I can walk her 15 minutes, does this mean 15 minutes once a day, or can I walk her for 15 minutes in the morning anf 15 minutes in the evening? I only ask as we want to think carefully about when we walk her, and also we are concerned about her hips, as I know with shepherds too much exercise can be detrimental. She tend sto get very hyperactive in the morning, and again in the evening, so we were not sure when we should walk her or if we could walk her twice.

Advice would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Morning and evening is fine - you could even add a 5 or 10 minute outing at lunchtime too, as at that stage they need such a lot of socialisation.

Thanks for that responce - I needed some clarification on what was best. Thank you.

Hi,

Don't let your pup up and down stairs until after at least 9 month old,or jumping on and off furniture,or doing tight turns in the garden.
Restrict free running outside the garden.
I know with my Goldens I cut down the amount of protein in their diet from 14 wks for hip development check with your breeder whether its necessary in GSD'S ,be careful about slippy floors where your pup may lose grip.

Briony

My GSD is 7 months, I never exercised him more than 5 minutes per day per  month of his life, he currently gets 35 mins per day or even less if he is playing with my older dog.

He has unlimited free play in the house and garden and has several short training sessions per day some of which may come out of his 35 minutes.

Exercise is different to "familiarisation".

Briony, I am a bit worried therefore about how my puppy plays. She whizzes around the garden, jumpgina dn leaping about. We have put in rapms in the garden so she never uses steps from the decking down to the grass, and we have gates up in the house so she cannot get up stairs, however, her play is very boistrous, and there is no way of stopping this unless I shut her in a room in the house, and even then she will pick up a toy and start throwing it for herself and then whizzing about, turning and jumping sharply. She does try to jump up onto the sofa, but she gets a stern no and we move her front legs off. She sofa is not very high, but now you have me worried that she is doing herself damage by doing this. It seems to be very hard balancing how a puppy is naturally with concerns for their joint health. I am really concerned with her play time.

If you don't allow them to run off steam properly they will a) not develop proper musculature and b) might develop behaviour problems.

As long as you are not FORCING the puppy to play/walk/run and it chooses its level of activity it will be fine.

A GSD is an active dog.

Hi,

I have 5 Golden Retrievers all from puppies controlled exercise is fine,all puppies will have a mad half hour,you just apply common sense like putting safty gate bottom stairs don't let children wind the puppy/young dog up so it gets overexcited and injuries can happen this is where mental stimulation is important.Good local training club ideal.
Doing handbrake turns on wet grass for example can easily do damage.
There is a difference to allow running off steam and knowing when to intravene and calm the pup down with a distraction technique e.g toy when they become too boistrous.
As for going on to the sofa as soon as a pup tried to put his paw on to come up the pup was taught no for us it always worked.9 months and under I dont let the dogs jump out of the car I lift them out we dont think about I guess we just used to doing it.

Golden Retrievers are also very active dogs but I always advise people to be careful of exercise in that 1 st year.

Briony :-)

I grew up with Gsds when I was younger ,we did not have any behavoral problems and they all had excellent muscle tone.

Hi,

I dont think you have too much to worry about :-) you have safety gates,try to let the grass dry off if its wet before letting her out,do you have slippy floors ?perhaps put non slip mats down.
Mine go to ring craft perhaps join local dog classes.

I have an area where i can put a pup out to play but is not belting up and down the garden ,a pup can have access to the whole garden if i'm with it.If I think the pup getting too excited like children they don't always know when it s time to calm down I intravene.I also don't allow my older dogs to get rough with the pup  at playtimes .

Dont allow other people to wind your dog up.The main thing is you are being sensible and not taking your pup on long walks .The amount of little pups that get dragged out to wear them out its a shame.

Briony

Well, my puppy started classes last week (she only turned 11 weeks old today) and she liked it a lot in terms of seeing other dogs (although when a black lab tried to play with her she didn;t know what the hell was going on!) so she does now have that outlet, and now we do  15 minutes of trainging, split into 3 five minute sessions everyday. We end these sessions with some controlled play (throwing a ball a few yards and getting her to bring it back). She loves this and when she gets tired, she will let us know of her own accord by lying down and just looking at us. Then we know she has had enough. In the morning and in the early evening, however, she is wired. She will bomb around the room (we have put mats down as we have wood floors which would cause her to slip without the mats). We also have a stair gate to make sure she only has access to the living room and the kitchen, and we have a stair gate blocking off the stairs. We also have made very shallow steps for her down into the kitchen, instead of the two large 'human size' steps, and she had ramps in the garden. I do worry about her boistrousness and her hips, but at the end of the day she has such a joy for life it is very hard to stop her! We do try and funnel that energy into training, or play. She likes her lead work she is now doing (probably because she gets a treat at the end!) She is a large girl at 11 weeks, nearly 2 stone, but the vet checked her over today and she is not fat by any means and it looks as though she is just going to be a very big girl, which also gives me cause for concern over her joints, but she certainly only gets her allocated amount of feed for her age and occasional treats such as a whole carrot (used as a toy more than anything) and very small cubes of boiled egg, apple, nectarine, or lean ham, but if she has these we take a tablespoon of her daily food out of the container. I do worry about her hips - she is my first dog and being a shepherd I do worry, but I want to thank you all for the advice and the discussion on the thread as it has helped me be aware of the precautions I need to take.
Thank you.

You sound like a very conscientious owner who's determined to do the best for her pup - I wish there were more like you! Just remember to have fun with her as well - she won't stay a little pup for long, so enjoy it!
:)

In the 4 weeks I have had her she has pretty much doubled in weight and one of her ears has gone up. I love her so much I can't believe I had so many years without her! I have so many photos of her already, I am determined to have lots of photos because they capture the memories so well. Already I look at photos of her in the first week we got her and I can't believe the difference!