# Puppy possibly overworked?



## Daenerys (Jul 30, 2011)

Ok so I am a little worried. Yesterday my fiance and I took Faolan to the park for a nice long walk. 80% of it was just a leisurely stroll on nice flat trails and the last 20% had some decent sized hills on a more hiking type trail (narrow, lots of tree roots). It took us about 2 hours roughly (as in probably a little less) and that was mostly because we took it slow with many pauses for rest and water. Well this morning Faolan seems quite worn out still, because when my fiance took him out before work I didn't even get woken up by the running around and craziness of an energetic puppy, which is totally unusual. And when I had him out for a potty break when I got up he threw up yellow bile and now he is just laying down again, no crazies. Did we possibly over-work him??


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## Sendiulino (Jun 20, 2011)

Two hours is way too long for a 3 month old puppy. At that age, abiding by the 5-minute rule plus a little more for really active dogs may be a good option .. 5 minutes per month of age, meaning you take him on a 15-25 minute walk. If you wanna blaze some trails, I'd suggest leaving the little one at home until the pup is older. 

The yellow bile vomit isn't unusual. It happens when they vomit and have nothing in the stomach to bring up, so all that comes up is stomach acid and liquids. The running-around-craziness may have been because he knew he was going to vomit, so after he did, no more crazies like you said. 

If the vomit doesn't happen again then I wouldn't think twice about it myself. My dog has thrown up two or three times in her life and has clearly been unrelated to illness. It could be anything from eating too fast to eating something that disagrees with her (grass, for example) or something along those lines..

If none of these seem to line up with the time frame your dog vomited within, I'd say the vomit could very well have been induced by stress (which raises the stomach acids, same thing in humans) from the day prior. You probably won't see him vomit again, hopefully. Sometimes these things just happen now and then. Multiple vomits though and I'd call the vet just in case.

Anyway, all in all, a 2-hour-outing for a 3-month-old puppy seems a bit much, even with rest along the way.


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## Daenerys (Jul 30, 2011)

25 minutes does absolutely nothing for his energy level, though, which is why we decided to walk him on the trail. Gahh, guess I will have to deal with with constant crazies for a few more months. =/ I wanted a husky so I could go out and do things, sucks that I still have to wait! I have like no patience for waiting


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## Greater Swiss (Jun 7, 2011)

Something else to consider with the crazies is that at least in Caeda's case, she'd get the crazies when she needed a nap too, but was too excited about the world to just go lay down. For a while we thought it as always even more exercise she needed....but not always the case. 
I'm not saying to expect the crazies to go away if you enforce quiet time, but I noticed early in our time with Caeda (at about 3 months or so) she would get really zoomy and bitey around 8-9pm (and occasionally during other times of the day). If she hadn't slept much that day it was pretty much a guarantee that it was time for a last potty break then bed. Sure, it meant if she went to sleep early we'd be up earlier than usual for a potty break, but that didn't last TOO long (even though sometimes it felt that way lol).


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## Niraya (Jun 30, 2011)

He's a puppy it's what they do. They're bundles of endless amounts of energy. I do agree that 2 hours is really too much for a three month old especially in the crazy humidity the east coast has been having. I don't even take Bella Out for a walk longer than 45 minutes in anything warmer than 80 degrees because she just can't take the heat because of their thick fur.

He'll have lots of energy but remember he's also a puppy so he needs to sleep just as much as he needs to expend that energy. If you aren't letting him rest all of the zoomies and crazies might be because he's really tired.

Just some things to think about.


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## hanksimon (Mar 18, 2009)

I agree that 2 hours is too much. However, that usually applies to on-leash time. If he is playing off-leash, can stop when he wants, and has access to water, once in a while might not be too bad. But, it sounds like you were walking a path, so even off-leash, he'd be compelled to keep up.

As the weather gets cooler, I do recommend that you condition him with more of these hikes, but closer to 30 - 45 min. As soon as it gets cold, you may find his energy level increasing significantly.


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## Canyx (Jul 1, 2011)

Daenarys, not to go too off topic but what park/trail in NC did you guys hike? 
And don't worry, once Faolan gets older I'm sure you'll be wishing that 2 hour hike was enough to burn his energy!


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## Daenerys (Jul 30, 2011)

Well he had been napping for about an hour before the walk and we walked at like 4:15 till about 6pm, and I guess that would explain why he got all zoomy right when we got back from the walk, lol, he was just tired. 

The trail we went to was at Lake Johnson park in Raleigh. 

hanksimon, all the stops we took were scheduled by him. We let him stop to lay down and sniff what he wanted, etc, so it was almost like being off-leash. All we did was keep him on the trail and going in one direction. Since this was his first real walk in the woods then I wanted to let him enjoy it his way  Come to think of it that is probably why it took so long, lol. That and we accidentally took a wrong turn at one point. The trail we took went around the smaller part of the lake.


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