When the Clocks Go Back: Adjusting Your Dog's Routine for Dark Evenings

On Sunday, November 1, the clocks go back an hour. You get an extra hour of sleep. Your dog gets breakfast an hour late and is not happy about it.

Dogs do not read clocks. They run on routine and daylight, and the time change throws both off at once.

What changes for your dog

• Meal times. If breakfast is at 7:00, your dog's body still thinks 7:00 is 8:00 for the first few days.
• The evening walk. In Waterloo Region and most of southern Ontario, sunset goes from around six to around five overnight. The walk after work is suddenly in the dark.
• Your schedule. You leave and come home at the same clock time, which is a different time to your dog.

Ease into it

If you have a dog who is very set in their ways, shift meals by about ten or fifteen minutes a day over the week before. By Sunday you are already on the new time.

If you forgot, that is fine too. Most dogs adjust within a week. Expect a few days of an early wake up call and a dog staring at you around dinnertime.

Could the walk move earlier?

If your schedule allows, a lunchtime or early afternoon walk in the daylight is worth it. Daylight is short between November and February, and dogs, like people, often do better with some of it.

Many people shift the big walk to the morning and keep the evening one short. That is a reasonable winter routine.

Making the dark walk safer

For most of us, at least one walk a day is going to be in the dark until March. A few things make a real difference:

• Be seen, and make your dog seen. Drivers see a dark coated dog on a dark road very late. An LED collar is visible from much further away than a reflective strip alone, and a reflective harness adds more on top.
• Wear something light yourself. A headlamp or a light coloured jacket.
• Walk facing traffic where there is no sidewalk.
• Stick to routes you know. Dark is not the time to explore a new trail.
• Shorter leash near roads. A retractable leash at full length is hard for drivers to see.

The pick up problem

Everyone who walks a dog in the dark knows this one. You know your dog went somewhere in that patch of grass. You cannot see where. You end up holding your phone flashlight in your teeth.

An LED bag dispenser clips to the leash and lights up the ground right where you need it, with the bags right there. It is a small thing that makes every dark walk less annoying.

Keep them busy indoors

Shorter or fewer walks can mean a restless dog in the evening. Ten minutes of sniffing work, like scattering part of dinner in a snuffle mat, tires a dog out more than you would expect.

For more on gear and visibility, read our full guide on walking your dog in the dark.