Hi, I am just interested to know what everyone does to help keep their dogs feet nice and tight. I have been told Beach walking, road walking, walking on pebbles, give vitamin c etc etc.

Im just curious to know what everyone does. I do know alot of it comes down to genes :-)

Agree with everything except the vitamin I do not believe in giving supplements. Have been told that to keep your dogs on pebbles is the best way but unless they are in kennel runs that is not possible.

How uncomfortable for the dog to be kept on pebbles all the time in a kennel run. Tight feet are bred for and if they are spread no amount of pebbles will help but if they are basically good road walking and the odd run on the beach will help keep them that way. Much kinder
Aileen

How uncomfortable for the dog to be kept on pebbles all the time

Well it would be uncomfortable for us but dogs seem perfectly happy if their run is surfaced in large pebbles, think it is the only way to judge is do they look uncomfortable and the truth is they don't.

> How uncomfortable for the dog to be kept on pebbles all the time
>
> Well it would be uncomfortable for us but dogs seem perfectly happy if their run is surfaced in large pebbles, think it is the only way to judge is do they look uncomfortable and the truth is they don't.

I am not sure how they look can really be a guide. Dogs are very uncomplaining creatures and  just put up with what ever life throws at them. I am sure they get used to living on pebbles if that is all they have known but surely as humans we can see that it is likely to be uncomfortable and shouldn't make them live like that.

I'm pretty sure my dogs wouldn't like being on pebbles for any length of time. As it is I've got a sort of gravel path (not pea shingle but the bigger stones) around the back of the house and most of the dogs take avoiding action and jump from the step, over the path, to get onto the slabbed area that makes up the rest of the "dog area". Others walk over it very gingerly.

Well it would be uncomfortable for us but dogs seem perfectly happy if their run is surfaced in large pebbles

Well my back garden is part large gravel and part flagstones, and that is the same for my entire male dog's kennel run. None of them chose to walk on the gravel or lay down on it, they always prefer the flat surface. On the other hand all the poo goes in the gravel and none of the other surface. It's like they see it as giant cat litter.

I was not talking gravel I was talking large pebbles - the kennel I had in mind had large pebbles, slabs and grass all the dogs were happy to spend the day on the pebbles and poo on the grass, the slabs were not used, don't know why perhaps they were prone to be hot in the summer and icy in the winter but the only walking on the slabs was done by people.

What size do you call large pebbles?

> Beach walking, road walking

My dogs have super tight feet and a judge once commented on how my youngest dog had the best he'd seen all day lol

Anyways I don't know if it's down to breeding or life style but my boys walks are:
Morning is off lead along a pathed glen for 30mins(they go crazy chasing each other etc) finished with 30mins road walking up a hill back home
Lunch 15 mins round the block
Evening All road walking for 45mins

We also go the beach on the odd weekend :)

We only get to go on the beach once a year as we live nowhere near one -but if nothing else we always take the dogs to the beach after judging at the Blackpool show. :) I've noticed though their feet get so splayed as they sink into the sand so I'd wonder if it wouldn't have the opposite effect, but I have no idea. It really is the opposite to road walking though.

> I've noticed though their feet get so splayed as they sink into the sand so I'd wonder if it wouldn't have the opposite effect, but I have no idea

Well the beaches on the Isle of Man aren't really tranquil sandy beaches..............more like stoney/rocky/smelly seaweedy beaches :-D

I spend most of my time trying to get the seaweed off the dogs! lol

I also got told to walk my pup on stoney ground to tighten her feet.  Worked a treat.  I took her to the beach as it is a peebly beach and she didn't complain but then we were only there for an hour every day.  The rest of the time she was on grass, carpet, flagstones.  We now have small gravel in our dog garden and I have never had splayed feet since.  Total believer here!

What size do you call large pebbles?

Pebbles too big for a puppy to swallow.

This run had slabs alongside the fencing where dogs will usually spend time running up and down but believe me or not they preferred the pebble area they even lay on it in preference to the slabs. There feet are totally different to ours in that they walk on the toe area like ruminants the area touching the ground being very small however apart from realising it would be impossible to judge the experience a dog will have through it's feet by trying it myself I can only judge by what I know of dogs and their behaviour, these dogs were happy on pebbles and my dogs are happy on pebbles although they have to put up with grass and concrete at home.

> There feet are totally different to ours in that they walk on the toe area like ruminants the area touching the ground being very small

The paw prints my dogs leave are always whole foot prints never just their toes - you can see all of their pads and neither of my dogs have splayed feet.

Feet are bred for and anything else is anecdotal.

Unless you can clone your dog and put one on pebbles and one not...you cannot test the theory.

I have never seen a boxer with open splayed feet get better no matter what, yet a tight cat foot is always just that...tight.

On the matter of large angular rocky pebbles..these are often used by those who want to keep their dogs quiet.
Dogs dont crash, play and lark around barking on wobbly, sharp uncomfortable stones...old trick :-) 
Like these here.. http://www.stonewarehouse.co.uk/chippings-gravel/eco-aggregates/terracotta-5-14mm

Mine would be unable to do the 'wacky races' on such stones!

you can see all of their pads

But the bone structure is where to look and that is equivalent to our toes not the whole foot - look up the back of the front leg and you will see a pad that is never walked on, that pad area is equivalent to our palm joint so the unused pad is equivalent to our wrist (the pastern) and the dew claw is equivalent to our small toe and that is not on the ground either only the first 4.  The hind quarters are the same the hock being the same area as our heel. It is wrong to compare a dog to a human they are much more like the horse.

I realise that Nova - but the soft fleshy pads are in contact with the ground and the dog will feel the surface through them. Part of the socialising process as a puppy is for a dog to walk on as many different surfaces as it can whilst it is still young to get it used to all sorts of surfaces and that is felt through the pads rather than the toe structure.

I live right next door to a shingle beach and my dogs quite happily run around on the pebbles for ages and it doesn't bother them at all - but the surface is far different to pebbles laid on top of hard ground. The shingle is very deep and the pebbles move under the dogs' weight whereas a layer of pebbles on the ground does not have the "give" and movement that the shingle does.

I also have pebbles in my garden along with much smaller decorative shingle and the dogs very rarely choose to run on it much preferring the grassed areas or the bare earth.

Our BC will not jump out of the car's with a pepple drive, we carry him and he then walks the long way around the path. Cocker jumps out no problem!! big furry feet!!