Transcript from the video:

Dog fitness question number nine. What is the best exercise to strengthen my dog’s knee? Love this question. You can refer to my blog, the number one exercise every dog should do. And there’s two exercises on there that I actually talked about in Dog Fitness question number six. So the best thing that you can do for your dog’s knees is called a step up and step over. The step up is one that can make a really big impact and it’s really simple.

I’ll share a story with you. I had a 4H dog. I used to help with 4H, and I watched this dog in state trials or county trials injure his iliopsoas on the field. Came off limping. So I went to talk to them and they’re like, he’s fine. And I was like, well, you know, I think he injured a muscle. Go see your vet, make sure everything’s okay. And then I can share with you an exercise that would help if you, you know, if you are interested in doing that.

So I saw him in class, I know, a few weeks later, and they said, oh, yes, he did injured his iliopsoas and it’s a hip flexor muscle. And now he’s doing much better. I’m like, great. They’re like, we want to know what that exercise was great. So I gave them a step up. They had their dog do that exercise morning and evening. And in a year he came back and was national champion in agility in the county fair.

Well, that’s a cool story. I just like to share that story. And I love them. I love that they use the exercise to help their dog. And their dog was out there performing at his best, doing the thing that he loves with his people. That’s what makes me happy. I get kind of choked up about that. So the step up is a great way to protect your dog’s knees.

Now, the other thing that these people did, which I also suggest, if you’re like, ah, another exercise into my routine, you can do it with breakfast, morning and night. And in number six, I shared with you this little piece of foam. So you can put this foam and then put their food bowl here. So they have to step, you have to raise their food bowl up a little bit.

They step on the foam and they eat. Now what that does is so when I’m going to show you, when they normally they’re eating like this with their head down, they’re getting some nice hamstring stretches. But if you raise their food bowl, they go from this to this. So now I’m engaging my glutes, hands and quads. And engaging the glutes, hams and quads protect the knee. And if they do that exercise twice a day while they’re eating.

Your dog is doing exercise twice a day. That’s amazing. So I’m going to show you now while Makoa is waiting patiently to do some exercise, I’m going to show you now what I do with macoa and what the difference is that you can. I want to make sure you can see this. So let me look. Just let me look where we’re at. Okay, so come here. Good girl.

So when she’s standing flat, she’s just holding her body flat. So I’m going to bring her over here. I’m going to come on this side. Yes. So see how it raises her body a little so her butt end is having to work. Girl, search. When I want to reset her, I just say search, throw some treats, then I can reset her. Or if I need to do something.

So I’m going to raise this up a little bit here. Step up. Yay. Good girl. So now you can see she has a little bit more of a slope in her body. Good job. And that’s going to help work those muscles back there to protect her knee. Now if you can see if I push her a little forward and back. So what I’m doing is I take a treat.

I’m a little backwards, forward, backwards, forward. And it’s just little micro movements. If I, if I use her nose as a gauge, I’m coming in front of her nose. Oops, above her nose, front of her nose, above her nose. So she gets searched. I think she was inhaling some of the treats. So a little in front of her nose and back in front of her nose, a little back.

And what she does when you when doing that, so front, lean, front, back, front, back. So these muscles are working, helps protect the knee. So those two exercises are amazing. There are more to be done with the knee. And that’s when I say, look, you know, talk to a professional rehab. That dog fitness trainer that has experience with that, like me, reach out to me or any other dog fitness trainer also that has experience with rehab knees.

Because knowing the knee anatomy and how it works and the nerves is really important in getting those knees stronger. I hope that helped and you guys go out and live your best life.