How to manage a group dog walk (Multi-dog walking for professionals)

Many new professional dog walkers are nervous about progressing from solo walks and duos, into full-blown multiple dog walks, and rightly so. Whenever pro dog walkers are criticised on social media, it’s normally surrounding an incident during a group walk. So let’s take a look at how to manage a group walk professionally and safely and maintain your hard won reputation.

One Dog

This is your starting point. Make sure your dog can be managed off lead on their own and if not, then they’ll need to either stay as a solo walk, or be on a lead during a group walk, depending on the reason he can’t be off lead.

Onlead dogs can make a group walk difficult. They can get excited by the presence of other dogs and want to join in all the fun. On a short lead, this makes for a frustrating walk for the dog, and an exhausting one for you having to hold them back.

A long line is a good compromise. Attached to a harness (never a collar) the long line can allow them to join in and run about, but you still have some control when it comes to recalling them.

But, total focus on that long line is needed to ensure it doesn’t wrap around any legs (dog or human!) and to make sure it doesn’t trip anyone up (dog or human!).

Although I feel that extendable leads have their place, I don’t believe that they should be used on a group walk.

For all your other dogs who happily return to you and are friendly, sociable dogs, they can progress to stage 2, paired walks.

Two Dogs

Onlead Walks

If you have an otherwise sociable friendly dog who for whatever reason can’t be offlead (bad recall, the owner wants them kept clean, elderly, blind, deaf etc.) pairing up two onlead walks might be an option.

Make sure the dog’s energy levels match up (pairing an excitable adolescent dog with an elderly dog won’t work, even if they do live on the same street…) and make sure they’re comfortable to walk, not pulling too much and happy to stay on the side of you rather than weaving.

Offlead Walks

If you already have two dogs with great recall then why not walk them together after a proper introduction?

Walking two dogs offlead will reduce your need to put in the distance on a walk which is much better for your own body (and the rate you go through boots too!).

Two dogs playing together will cover far more ground than you ever would onlead and it’s way more fun for them.

Call them back to you regularly, break out the good treats to make sure this perfect recall is repeated next time you call them and you shouldn’t have any bother getting them back to you and onleads if you need to.

TOP TIP: If you need to keep two dogs near you in an emergency or quickly, forget about fiddling about clipping a lead to their collar. The fastest way to restrain two dogs once you’ve recalled them (other than holding their collars), is to slip one end of your lead under their collar and grab both ends of the lead. You can do this one handed and even slip the lead under both dog’s collars if it’s long enough. You never know when a reactive dog and owner might come along and need your dog’s on leads FAST.

Three Dogs

Things start to get fun once you get to three dog walks.

You should always have in your mind how you’re going to get them all back and onlead in the fastest possible way in case anything happens. A reactive dog an owner might turn up, a dog fight might kick off on the other side of the field you’re in, someone might be lurking looking a bit dodgy and giving you dog thief vibes, or a class of thirty primary school children might turn up to the park for some outdoor learning and you just know your dogs are about to cause chaos.

Grabbing two dogs is relatively easy, holding three or more starts to get tricky. You shouldn’t have any trouble calling them back to you (if you do then consider a long line for the one who hasn’t quite learned their recall yet) but then what? Grabbing the collars of 3 dogs at once is quite a feat depending on the dog’s size and if they turn, it can get quite painful for you twisting and trapping your fingers.

Love them or loath them, slip leads absolutely have a place here. The whole point of them was to enable owners to take them off and put them on in a second.

If you’ve called your dogs back and popped a slip lead on you know the dogs are safe and can be moved out of the situation if needed.

Four Dogs

Four dogs are the size of group where you might start to consider an onlead rotation, so that one dog is always on a lead, leaving you keeping an eye on three offlead dogs and monitoring the picking up of poops etc.

Then you can call one dog back, leash up another dog and let the onlead dog off for a run and play.

Four dogs is also the point at which most members of the public will spot you as a dog walker, rather than an owner (Three will make them wonder but four will leave them feeling confident that you’re a walker).

It’s common to find that four dogs is a comfortable limit for a harmonious dog walk, both between the dogs, for your stress levels and for the good of the general public. Never be pressured into taking more just for the pay bump if you’re not comfortable.

Five Dogs or More

Firstly, check your insurance, some insurers limit you to four dogs, some six and some can raise that limit of you specifically ask them to.

Five dogs, in my experience, has the potential to become chaotic so choosing the right dogs, well behaved dogs, dogs who travel well and get along, is absolutely key to the success of any walks of more than 4 dogs.

With larger groups keep two main things in mind.

Firstly, choose your walk location carefully. Pick countryside walks over parks, you want the environment to be as deserted and secluded as possible to reduce the likelihood of coming across the public in any sort of large numbers.

Secondly, consider the extra time required. Not only to collect and drop off all the dogs, but also to rinse and towel them off, and extra travel to a suitable walking location. Sometimes it can actually make more sense just to do two smaller walks depending on the locations of the dogs.

Final Thoughts

When walking groups you may wish to use one recall word to get them all back rather than calling individual names, or even get a whistle!