Our favorite activities to share with our cattle dog
How do I decide what to do with Scout? What does she enjoy most? A look at our favorite physical, mental, and social activities—and whether they fill or drain her cup.
How do I decide what to do with Scout? What does she enjoy most? (For that matter: What do I enjoy most?) Here’s a look at some of our favorite physical, mental, and social activities—and how I think about whether they fill or drain our heeler’s metaphorical cup.
Thank you for reading the Paws and Reflect nuance-letter! Today’s post is on the longer end, combining thoughts about canine biological fulfillment overall, Scout’s individual preferences, and several links to related reading. The whole thing might get cut off in your email inbox, so I recommend clicking the headline to read it in your browser if possible. You’re the best.
How I choose my dog’s activities on a given day
The short answer: I consider what our life has looked like recently and try to identify any big “gaps”. If something’s been missing? I focus on that! If our activities have been pretty balanced? I just ask what we’ll both get the most satisfaction from in the current moment.
Averages over single data points
Looking at “averages over single data points” has been an ongoing journey since I adopted Scout. This idea helps me feel significantly less stressed on the overwhelming days.
It isn’t about walking X distance every morning. It’s about giving my dog enough exercise overall.
It isn’t about playing a set number of minutes. It’s about fulfilling my dog’s biological drives overall.
It isn’t about settling at a new place every day. It’s about maintaining my dog’s public exposure and comfort overall.
Ultimately: It isn’t about following a set routine day in and day out. It’s about making sure Scout’s cup is filled on the average.
It’s okay if we have a really lazy day where all our dog does is eat her daily calories and go outside to pee a few times. And it’s okay if we have a really crazy day where we ask a lot of her and she’s exhausted by the end!
What matters is that, when we “zoom out”, things are in balance.
How I think about things that “fill” or “drain” my dog’s cup
My daily goal with Scout used to be to “tire her out”. I didn’t put any value judgments on the type of tired. As long as she wasn’t bursting with energy at the end of the day? Cool, good job team!
But then I realized there is a huge difference between being tired because you just had the most stressful or boring day of work ever… and being tired because you exercised your brain and body in satisfying ways.
Both might send you to bed early. Only one gives good dreams.
Instead of fixating on Scout’s surface-level energy today, I focus on her biological fulfillment. Is she satisfied? Is she getting lots of reps in the Seeking and Play emotional systems? Or is she exhausted because I’m pushing her too far too often?
While it’s inevitable to feel drained in a not-so-satisfying way sometimes (and it’s important to build frustration tolerance!) I want Scout, on as many days as possible, to feel the type of tiredness that comes from a job well done. From satiated instincts and drives.
So I think mostly about satisfaction and enjoyment here. Something like fetch, for example, could fill Scout’s cup from a fulfillment standpoint but drain her physical energy. Many activities do a bit of both. More examples below!
Primarily physical activities
High energy play! (fills her cup)
Scout is more playful than ever nowadays. We’ve worked hard to build her confidence to let loose in a range of environments! Play is one thing we do every single day, no matter what (though it can take different forms depending on where we are and how we’re feeling).
Scout’s favorite aspects of play are “fight” (based on the part of a canine’s natural predatory sequence after catching prey and before consuming it) and “chase” (yep, exactly what it sounds like). She also likes to celebrate (flaunt that she has something in her possession) particularly if we’re cheering her on.
Because of these preferences, we spend most of our intense playtime on tug. We let her win regularly—but only after she’s really put in effort. We also enjoy cooperative chase & catch, which mostly looks like a pretty traditional game of fetch now that we’ve cleaned it up.
Play almost always fills Scout’s cup. The only times it leaves her frustrated are if we mess up and ask for too many obedience commands, especially in a chaotic environment where she’s struggling to feel safe.
More reading:
This blog’s entire “Play With Your Dog” tag
Runs and hikes and other fast-paced adventures (fill her cup)
Scout runs with us less often now that she’s older and gets sore more easily. (We humans are in better shape than ever since moving into the van, so our physical abilities are sadly just starting to diverge.) She does still join us about half the time, though, especially if it’s an easier route. And we’ve had more opportunities to hike than ever recently!
These activities usually fill her cup—but depending on the environment they can have their stressful moments too. In general, the busier a trail or road is, the less enjoyable it will be for our heeler.
Primarily mental activities
Structured walks (drain her cup but build relevant skills)
A structured walk is where I ask Scout to hold a “heel” position next to me as we move through the world. We don’t have a flashy focused heel like you’ll see in dog sports—she just needs to stay within a few inches of me, give or take, regardless of what’s going on around us.
We don’t go on structured walks as often as we used to. When we lived in our first few apartments (and were in the initial throes of addressing Scout’s dog reactivity) I listened to advice to have her heel just about every time we left home. Nowadays we focus a lot more on self-regulation at liberty—but on occasion a structured walk is still nice to maintain impulse control!
I say that structured walks usually drain our heeler’s cup, but (as always) it depends on our exact approach in a given moment. Fast-paced heeling with lots of rewards, direction changes, and celebration? Way different than a slow, steady march down a busy sidewalk.
More reading:
Sniffaris (fill her cup)
This is our favorite way to walk nowadays! A sniffari is pretty much what it sounds like. Scout leads the way on a long-line, flexi, or all the way off leash. We explore surrounding scents and interesting things as we go along. Sean and I can recall her if needed (say we’re about to pass another person and dog) but try not to interfere unless it’s necessary for safety or public respect.
More reading:
Food searches (usually fill her cup)
We sadly can’t set these up very well in the van, but they’re still one of my favorite ways to feed Scout when the environment is right. For a food search, we break her meal up into several small parts, often add broth or a smelly treat to make it easier to find, ask her to hold a sit or down stay while we hide a portion out of sight, release her to sniff it out, and repeat until the whole meal is gone. Our heeler gets to use her nose and tap into her canine scavenger instincts.
More reading:
Box feeding (drains her cup while building relevant skills)
At its simplest, box feeding is a concentration exercise where Scout indicates (sniffs / points with her nose) on an article (a small object to indicate that the “restaurant” is open) inside of an opaque box. When she stays committed to the task through distractions, I drop food in the box as a reward.
For a while our cattle dog got almost all of her meals from the box. We don’t do it very often anymore (partly because fitting her original box in the van wasn’t a great use of space) but I enjoyed seeing her focus grow when we first started.
More reading:
Scattering her food in the grass or a snuffle mat (fills her cup)
Sniffing can lower a dog’s heart rate and decrease blood pressure. Feeding in a snuffle mat or scattering food in the grass (when the environment is safe for it) is a great way to get our heeler to use her nose! This is especially helpful if she’s been stressed.
More complex food puzzles (can drain or fill her cup)
Giving our dog her meals in puzzle toys isn’t as relaxing as scattering her food—she has to think more about what she’s doing instead of just casually sniffing in a given area—but she seems to thoroughly enjoy different treat-dispensing balls and contraptions. Especially if she hasn’t gotten much other stimulation lately.
More reading:
Trick or obedience training sessions (can drain or fill her cup)
Most of our active training sessions have been food based (though we’ve branched more into play-based work as time has gone on).
Depending on how we structure things, tricks and obedience can both fill or drain Scout’s cup. In our early days (when commands were new to her) it took a lot more effort for her to perform than it does today (when most things we ask for are second nature).
More reading:
Anything else using a lot of impulse control (drains her cup but can build skills)
In general, any activity that requires Scout to exercise a lot of impulse control will drain her fulfillment cup but build useful frustration tolerance over time. I try to be mindful of how often I ask her to really work her brain like this—and make sure to intersperse plenty of more relaxing things so she can recharge. As always, a balance!
Primarily emotional and social activities
Snuggling and sharing affection (fills her cup)
I love “just hanging out” with Scout. It feels a little weird to include this on a list of “activities” I share with my dog, since this sort of social time often feels very passive—but it’s a huge part of our life!
Snuggling up in the van bed, sitting next to each other in the front cab chairs, giving her a focused canine massage… (*sing song voice*) these are a few of our favorite things. And they really are fulfilling for everyone involved.
More reading:
Exposure-focused activities
Public outings (can drain or fill her cup)
Bringing Scout into public places is something I’ve written about a lot. Supported exposure to the world has been an integral part of helping her feel more confident in herself and trusting in us! We love relaxing at breweries, coffee shops, or cute public parks as a family—but I recognize that not every environment is suited to her sensitive nature. Certain spots provide more satisfaction than others.
More reading:
There’s almost always overlap between categories
An important note: I can’t really think of any activity that’s just physical or just mental or just social. I also can’t really think of any that only fill my dog’s cup or only drain it. While I did my best to categorize our go-tos here for the sake of organization… nothing exists in a vacuum.
Scout usually lets me know if something feels different on a given day. I’ve learned to trust her—and myself—more to be able to adjust in the moment.
Such a power packed post filled with such important insights. I used to do all I could to wear Isa out too and it ended up being to his detriment.
I wish I would have had all of this 5 years ago. Everyone should save this post for life!
But also curious what you do with Scout if you are going some place she can’t come with? Do you take her to cafes and restaurants and things always? Obviously you wouldn’t want to just leave her in the van. 🚐
This is such a timely post! With the weather getting warmer and my community starting to fill up with tourists, things that used to be easy for Kazia (like our bathroom break walks) are now becoming quite stressful, so I'm having to recategorize activities. I rent a private field once a week so we can both decompress in a safe outside space (very enjoyable for both of us), and this time is needed more and more now. Yesterday I tried taking her on a new-to-us trail that a friend told me was very quiet, but turned out to be way too busy (for Kazia's current skills). I gave up after 30 minutes and turned around. Today is going to be spent figuring out how to fulfill her exercise needs without traumatizing her.