Human beings love spontaneous activities, which is why you will scream—in a good way—at a surprise. For dogs, it is a little different. The life of a dog revolves around four basic needs; food, sleep, exercise or play, and potty. Creating a routine helps your waggy dog to know what is expected of him or her—and eliminates stress on your path. It can help them to avoid destructive behaviors, anxiety, as well as keep them generally happy.

Inasmuch as your pooch will appreciate a form of stable pattern of activity, when setting a routine, there is a catch. The requirements for different breeds may differ slightly. Also, you need to take the age of your pooch into consideration. When you have two dogs of varying ages, this can be a little complex especially because you don’t want one to feel the other is getting more attention.

Benefits of routines

For a newly adopted furry friend, having a routine helps in housetraining and adjusting to their new home. By all means, you would want to avoid indoor potty accidents. Therefore, having a feeding routine helps you to anticipate when they need to potty. This may be more difficult to predict if your feeding pattern is haphazard.

Another thing you want to avoid with your faithful dog is excessive weight gain—and the health risks that comes with it. Without a feeding routine, you may be tempted to leave food for the dog several times in a day which will ultimately lead to weight gain. Generally, if you want to train your dog to conform to a particular behavior or to understand hand signals or verbal instructions, consistency is the key.

However, it is not only your dog that benefits from a routine—you do too. A routine helps you to understand your dog better. If your pooch is having any health challenge, you will find out faster—especially during your dog walking session. It helps you to plan your own routine and frees you of pet-related anxieties.

The challenge of daily routine

As your dog grow, there is a need to adjust the daily routine to the needs of their new age. Knowing when and how to make this transition can be challenging. It can also be a source of stress for you and your faithful companion. The second biggest challenge with strict routine is keeping up. Imagine a scenario where you fall sick and can’t take your dog out for a walk or you are too busy with work. This can lead to anxiety for you pooch.

Benefits of daily structure

In simple terms, daily structure is a flexible routine. Having a flexible routine from the onset makes it easier for your pooch to adapt to changes whenever the need arise. Let’s say, rather than making it compulsory for your pooch to wake up by 7am and eat by 7:30am, you can have the schedule that stipulates the dog will eat in the morning but not time bound.

Effective way to make changes to a routine

Transitioning from strict routine to a daily structure is a challenging activity that every dog lover may need to deal with. However, if done right, is highly rewarding. One thing you should never do is to change the entire routine at once. Instead, make tiny changes to different parts of the routine while paying attention for signs of stress.

For example, you can start by breaking-free for strict feeding times to flexible times. Once your pooch has become used to the new flexible feeding schedule, you can start planning on making changes to their sleeping or exercise time. Talking about exercise, one way to ensure a safe dog walking session is to use a leash attached to a dog name harness with custom label.

Final words to every dog lover

Make sure your routine is realistic. For a routine to be effective, your needs and that of your pooch need to be taken into consideration. While a routine is good for dog training, you don’t want to put your dog at a disadvantage when the routine is broken. Thus, having a flexible routine works better at helping you to achieve your goal as well as helps your pooch to build resilience. Feel free to scroll through our blog for more informative articles.

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