Nothing to do with dogs i know, but hub has promised we WILL move to the countryside in about 5 years. this has given me something to look forward to (and stopped him being nagged at so much!)  but i dont know how big an acre of land is? would an acre on the side of a back garden be big enough to exercise dogs or is it the size of a postage stamp? I can imagine the size of a football pitch so if anyone can compare it to that size for me i would be gratefull!

I won't bother giving the exact measure but basically an acre is equal to about 76% of a football field.
This would be a lovely size garden for your dog to explore and play but obviously still doesn't compensate for that special walks you will have.

A regular-shaped acre would have sides 208 feet long: that's roughly 34 six-foot fence panels for each side. Certainly a good size for a garden allowing dogs freedom to run and play, but it's not enough for their sole exercise (unless they're very tiny dogs).

thanks for promp replies- i think i may have to look for 2 acres to be on the safe side!

Why the idea of enough acres to exercise?  If your out in the country then there will be many lovely walks hopefully to take your dog out on! :)

2 acres is an awful lot of grass to cut!

And it will be vvv expensive, I fear (unless you're going to Wales, I suppose) - but property with land like that is a tad hard to find!

Margot

i meant i wanted to walk my dogs on my own land! not chuck them out on their own! and yes, i know it will be expensive hence the 5 year wait!

Also think how long it will take you find all those doggy poos over two acres

You would have to train them to do poo patrol :D

If it's any help, an acre has a perimeter of less than 300 yards - it wouldn't take you long to walk that! I have access to 45 acres of grassland a quarter of a mile up the road - to walk there, around the perimeter and walk home takes 25 minutes ... if you want to walk your dogs on your own land you're looking at a lot!

The back garden where we used to live in Kent was just over an acre and although good for throwing a ball and having a quick play, that was it's limit.

The only good thing about it was that along with walking the dogs in the other field, I used to keep nice and trim plodding up and down with the lawnmower.

As for poo clearing, mammoth task that used to turn into a game of hide and seek and take me at least 45 minutes:rolleyes:

Excellent thing about living in the country is all the fantastic walks that are waiting to be found. In saying that, where we are currently, if we want a really long, isolated walk off road, then I have to pile them into the car, which kind of defeats the object.

Hi, I don't know WHERE abouts you are planning to live, but I had a large house, with 2 and a half acres of land, and around half an acre of river frontage(the river Nith) in Scotty Land and ot was VERY reasonable!! I could have bought 3 houses like that for the price of my semi in Leamington!!Mind you prices have gone up a way since I moved and would cost you twice as much now, but then all the other prices have gone up as well!! I used to sell the bales off the land and it really paid for itself...the dogs used to have a ball, but then they are Newfies and loved the water way too much...could never get them out of the River! But that acreage was about right, but then I also tok them to the Coast and up into the Forestry commission for a change too! I really, really miss it! :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:   Have fun!

An acre is a fair size, my dogs are lucky then they have 100 acres to roam in!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Your place in Scotland sounded absoloutly idyllic!
Oh how my springer would love it!
I quite often watch the tv prog. A Place in the Country, but am never really interested in the house, just the land that comes with it and the surrounding countryside.
When it has acres of land and beautiful views across hills and vale, i always say, "now that's what i call springer country, we could be happy there!"
Never actually though what rest of family might think!
How could you bare to move from a place like that?!

If you moved South to The New Forest, you'd have thousands of acres on which to walk your dogs :)

Which is just as well because a decent house with that amount of land could set you back £800,000 to aover a million pounds!!! THere is a house down the road from me, hardly any garden at all, Probably about a quarter of an acre if not less, that is over a million to buy. I'd want a castle for that kind of money!!

I think you can get any amount of land you want, you just have to look in the right area's. For example area's where land is cheap and you see a lot of property with about 3-6 acre's are Lincolnshire (lots there!) also most parts of Wales, particularly Carmarthenshire and also Gloucestershire. It really depends what part of the country you want to live in! For example I have seen 7 acre property for £349,500 in Llanelli (Carmarthenshire). That kind of money where I live in Hampshire, would probably buy you a nice house in a close with a postage stamp garden, or maybe a nice-ish older house with possibly quarter of an acre - max.
It really depends where you want to be.

Rachel

We've just moved to a farmhouse in a VERY rural spot in Lincolnshire  with no near neighbours - surrounded by farmland and with just over an acre of land - we paid £260,000 for it last August - so yes it can be done :D :D

Yvonne

I'm feeling very lucky reading this. I can't believe the price of property in some areas The OH's parents have 33 acres (plus house and outbuildings) which we stand to 'inherit' in a few years as they want to retire somewhere smaller and more manageable. Not my preferred location, I admit, but we would never be able to afford so much land elsewhere so I'm prepared to compromise. Besides, it means room for more dogs and the OH wants to install a small lake for the Newfie(s) (oh, and the Spanish Water Dog that I will eventually convince him that we have to have :D )

I live in lincolnshire and although property prices has gone through the roof in the past 4 years they are still very reasonable.  My husband was looking at aerial view photos of our area yesterday and I was amazed at how much greenery we are surrounded by.  There is no way a property in this area would cost you 800k - over £1 million.  There was a farm a while ago for sale not too far from us with 187 acres of land and that wasnt £1 million. 

Ahhh had to move for love and my huzzy band, otherwise I would still be there!!! We went up there a while ago tovisit some friends and the folks that own it now have a few dogs and a couple of horses...boy was I ever green??!! LOL Never mind, we bought a Bungalow on Lesvos, with about an acre of land, 200m from the Village Harbour(we want a boat too!) for around £55,000...that and the SUN too!! LOL A lovely Aegean Sea!! LOL Take care, Dawn X

Even two acres is not a very big piece of property for exercising anything but the smallest, and youngest (maybe oldsters too) of dogs.  But it is an awful lot of work if you have it all in lawn or gardens.  I am lucky to have a 1,000 acre block of forest a 10 minute walk from my home.  Poochie girl and I use the fire access roads in it and have 3, 5, 7 and 10 kilometre routes we use.  We can get around the 10 k loop in under two hours when walking and on a good fast day of cross country skiing we can do in an hour and a 15 minutes, touching all four sides of the block.  We're really hoofing it mind you, but that does include time to play and swim in the pond.  Sure makes even 1,000 acres seem not so big.

:rolleyes:Spot the colour!!

??? what colour

Green from envy? In that case, me too :-) .
Karen

Duh :D 

If you mean me, Ruby Tuesday, I'm very lucky and I know it.  Wish the OH felt the same way.  Subdivisions are developing all around us and he would like to move to a less densely habited area, but not too far north in Ontario, Canada. 

Besides the 1,000 arce tract of reforestation I also have the Trans-Canada Trail right across the road from our house and three rural property owners on the other side of the trail have given me permission to walk, snowshoe, ski on their land as well.  We did that yesterday and the foot of snow still on the ground is so hard (-19C last night) that even I can run on it without breaking through.

We also have several large provincial parks, forest management and wildlife areas within a half hour drive where I can spend several hours hiking or skiing and poochie girl can be off leash.  The Bruce and Ganaraska Trails are nearby too.

So, I say to the OH, "sure, I'll move.  As long as I get equivalent trail and land access."