Wire Fox Terriers are an energetic breed. Nothing brings them more joy than you taking them out on a walk, playing fetch in the park, or simply engaging in a game of tug of war. As fun as these activities are, how long should they go for?
As a general guideline, a small-sized dog like the Wire Fox Terrier requires at least 30 minutes of exercise such as running each day, and can go up to an hour if the exercise involves lower intensity activities such as walking or hiking.
Of course, there are also many circumstances you need to take into consideration and that’s what we’ll be looking into today.
Table of Content
- How Does Age Affect a Wire Fox Terrier’s Exercise Needs?
- How Much Running/Walking Does a Wire Fox Terrier Need?
- Exercising On Rainy Days
- What Happens If Wire Fox Terriers Don’t Get Enough Exercise
- Conclusion
How Does Age Affect a Wire Fox Terrier’s Exercise Needs?
For puppies in the early stages of development, you need to be aware that their growth plates are not yet fully closed. Hence, too much exercise may do more harm than good to their bone development.
The growth plates of a small-sized breed like the Wire Fox Terrier typically fully close when they’re about 12 months old. Prior to that, indoor activities are more than sufficient to provide them with the level and amount of exercise they need.
However, if you do take them out for a walk or to be socialized with other puppies, then you can use the ‘5 minutes for every month of age‘ rule. For example, if your puppy is 3 months old, then the outdoor activities should last for 15 minutes. For a 5-month-old puppy, that would be 25 minutes.
As your dog ages, the level of exercise it’ll need will change as its energy and mobility level decreases. Especially so when there are health issues involved.
With age, you don’t necessarily need to reduce the amount of time your dog needs for exercising, but the intensity of the activity does.
Though Wire Fox Terriers are not known to have joint issues, impact from jumping or excessive running may cause injuries for older dogs. Be sure to understand the physical condition of your dog and adjust accordingly.
For walks, you may consider breaking an hour’s worth of walking into two 30 minutes sessions or three 20 minutes sessions. The bottom line is, every dog at every stage is slightly different, hence you’ll need to be observant and plan your dog’s exercises according to the state they’re in.
How Much Running/Walking Does a Wire Fox Terrier Need?
Though Wire Fox Terriers enjoy a good chase, stamina was never their strong suit. One minute they’re running swiftly chasing a ball or playing with a friend, and the next you’ll see them lying on the floor catching their breath.
Fun fact, during the good old hunting days, Wire Fox Terriers were often being carried to the hunting grounds in a pouch on horseback, as opposed to the common misconception of them running alongside packs of hunting hounds.
Only upon arriving at their destination were the Wire Fox Terriers released to the ground to begin their fox bolting work.
In our case, Anu’s (our Wire Fox Terrier) daily one-hour exercise routine is split up into 30-40 minutes of outdoor activities, and 15-20 minutes of indoor activities.
When we’re out, we would usually start out by letting him run on his own for a bit as a form of warming up, followed by a session of fetch.
During fetch, we would put a hand out by our side at waist height when Anu returns with the ball, and he would jump up and touch our hand with the ball in his mouth. Not only is this a fun thing to do, but it also allows us to gauge his energy level by how high he could jump.
Anu would have no problem reaching our waist height in the beginning, but as his energy depletes, the jumps would get lower and we’d know that it’s time to warm things down with a walk and let him do his sniffing.
Exercising On Rainy Days
To be honest, we avoid getting him wet at all costs (I’m sorry). Because whenever Anu gets out in the rain, he enjoys ‘shoveling’ into the mud. That’s right, it’s not your typical ‘roll-in-the-mud’, he would lay down and ‘shovels’ himself into the ground with his hinds.
Needless to say, this would always end up with a full shower package and because Wire Fox Terriers tend to have more sensitive skin, too much showering can be problematic.
So for rainy days, it’s usually indoor activities like tug of war or he’ll chase us around the house trying to get his toy off our hands. We would conduct these activities in a 10-15 minutes session, and about 3-4 sessions throughout the day.
But note that in situations like this, we don’t always fulfill the one-hour-per-day quota, but given that Anu is a very well-tempered boy, his unused energy doesn’t get channeled into undesired behaviours. But a few zoomies are to be expected.
On occasions when it’s only drizzling and we can easily clean him up with a wipe-down and dry him off, we’ll still take him outside but would stay away from the grass.
What Happens If Wire Fox Terriers Don’t Get Enough Exercise
Like with any breed, not having enough exercise can have a negative effect on a Wire Fox Terrier both physically and emotionally.
The physical aspects are more obvious, from gaining weight to the lack of muscular strength, which ultimately can affect mobility.
But for us, the emotional side of things is what we’re more concerned about. It’s important for us to provide an adequate amount of interaction with our pooch throughout the day, be it indoors or outdoors.
When your dog doesn’t get enough mental and physical stimulation, the pent-up energy can be reflected in various undesired behaviours such as barking, destroying of things, anxiety and restlessness.
Think of it from a human’s perspective, you don’t have to go to the gym to stay healthy. But being trapped indoors, just sitting there all day without anything to do, no internet or other forms of stimulation, we bet you’ll go crazy within an hour.
Luckily for a small breed like the Wire Fox Terrier, it’s relatively easy to conduct fun activities indoors that can both meet the daily exercise needs and mental stimulation. Things we do indoors include:
- fetch (down the hallway);
- chase – running from room to room, up the bed, couch, around tables and chairs;
- hide and seek (either to find us or one of his toys);
- tug of war;
And as mentioned, we do this in several 10-15 sessions throughout the day. You don’t have to play fetch or tug of war for 30 mins or one hour straight. Give it a try and see what type of activities works best for your Wire Fox Terrier.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the above types of activities and the amount of time spent exercising serve as a useful and practical guidelines. But ultimately, it’s about being consistent with your daily activities with your pooch and understanding what works, and fine-tuning your routine accordingly.
