what can I do with my dog - agility or obedience etc??

foreign_correspondent

Hello,

I wonder if anyone can advise me. I have a small rescue dog, who loves learning new things and will do anything for food :rolleyes: (much like the rest of the family lol!)

She already has good basic obedience, and has learnt all the regular stuff (sit, lay, beg, crawl, roll over, paw etc) and I have just won a hefty bet with the OH that I couldnt teach her to belance a dog biscuit on her nose and keep it there till I told her to eat it! (pretty pointless trick really, but she has cracked it - initially it was impossible to get a biscuit within six inches of her head without her snaffling it!)

Now I am running out of things to teach her, but she really enjoys learning things, and I think it is stimulating and good for her...So I am wondering what can I do with her next? I wondered about a class, something like agility or obedience, but dont know what would suit her best!

She is a small dog, about corgi sized, but not quite so short in the leg, probably about 4 years old, and quite laid back, however she does have mad five minutes every now and again, where she does a comedy run at about fifty miles an hour and skids about all over the place! She loves fuss and food, so is easy to motivate.

any ideas? And how can I find reputable classes locally?

thanks in advance:beer:

fc x

pboae

Are either of these trainers near you?
http://www.apdt.co.uk/trainers_area.asp?area=Nottinghamshire
They both do KC good citizen, which is obedience, and clicker training, which is great for teaching tricks and games.

Penny Laverick also does Heel Work to Music (HWTM), which is basically teaching your dog to dance. If you search for Mary Ray on youtube you'll see lots of videos of HWTM.

Generally dogs need to be naturally active to get the most out of agility or flyball (though not always, some dogs learn to love it). But HWTM isn't quite as energetic, and it sometimes suits more laid back dogs better.

The link for Sheila Hocken's site is wrong on that page it is http://www.sheila-hocken-dog-training.com/ She wrote Emma and I, I've heard she is an excellent trainer, though I've never seen her myself.

foreign_correspondent

Hi pboa,

thanks, that great! - they are a bit far south for me, but not a million miles away - can I ask you a few more questions? - I am not really sure whether she would get a lot from obedience as she is already pretty obedient, does all the basic stiff fine, - do you have any idea whether obedience is likely to have activities they could get us doing which would be a bit of a stretch for her to learn?

Re HWTM - I think the dog would love it, but I worry I would feel like a prat, and step on the dog!

Re Agility - I dont know whether she would be too laid back or not - she is a chilled out dog at home but has a mad run round the park every day - she seems to really love a manic galloping runabout, and will jump over ditches etc quite easily!

She would be dreadful at flyball, when I chuck a ball she just looks at me like 'eh? what did you do that for?' !!

Thanks for the links - just looking at the Shiela Hocken one now.

pboae

I'd feel too daft to do HWTM too, but some people (and dogs) love it!

I think she'd be fine in obedience classes. Once you get beyond the bsaics (sit/stay/etc) it becomes as much about getting the dog to think through problems as it is about doing as they are told. Which makes it a lot more challenging and interesting for both of you. So it might include games like search and retrieve of hidden items as well as tricks and straight forward commands.

cluuuuur

At our obedience classes we do the "usual suspects" (sit/stay/heel, etc) but we do a lot more advanced varients on these things, mixed up so that no two classes are ever the same.

We do heelwork weaving around chairs, retrieves, drop recalls (where you call the dog from the other side of the room and get them to 'down' half way to you), send aways (encouraging the dog to walk away from you to a certain point, down and stay), positions on the move (sit/down/stand stay while owner continues walking, and dog waits for you to return), experimenting with scent-retrieves, and we've done some basic HWTM, but none of the scary dancey stuff! The dogs get a lot out of it (we've been going as long as we've had both of our dogs, and they're never bored) training-wise, and it's a great place for socialisation.

Our more sedate dog (who also doesn't know what to do with a tennis ball) has successfully done agility - it took her a few weeks to get into it, and she was always quite sedate on the course, taking it at her own pace, but she really loved it - and placed second in the little competition we did purely because of how sedate she was - it meant that she was touching all of the contact points and not running off-course.

foreign_correspondent

thanks again - I might give obedience a go, I suppose I am a bit wary of paying out and going to a class if it doesnt do much more than what I can do with her on my own...
I will have a look on the website you linked me to pboae, and see if I can find anyone a bit further towards north notts, thanks.

cluuuuur

As an idea, how about ringing a couple of classes near you, and seeing if you can observe (without your dog) to see if it suits you before signing up? Our instructor allows this, and it's a good way of seeing if the exercises and instruction styles will suit you and your needs.

foreign_correspondent

Thanks everyone, I will do a bit of research and take it from there!
fc x