Quote:
Originally Posted by TrinaJ  Jett is a very High Energy dog so i need to do more things with her (currently we train twice per week; Wednesday night at the Rotty Club and Saturday afternoons at my local Dog Club), we go on 4 x 1/2 hour walks every day but STILL she has an astounding amount of energy. So i enquired about Agility. I was told that i was not allowed to enrol her until she was 12 months old and because she is a rotty maybe i would have to wait until she was 18 months old.
Can someone please tell me what other things I can do with her at this age? |
If there is a puppy agility class somewhere nearby, I don't see any harm in that. It would (or more appropriately - should) just be foundation work in agility (getting used to low board work, wobbly surfaces, going through standards with poles on the ground, learning directional signals, etc).
I waited to start agility until my dog was two - and really it had to do with my belief that she should have a good foundation in obedience before being exposed to the crazy chaos that agility certainly is for many people/dogs who participate in it (they are everywhere!). I'm not going there, but they do come with the territory and I want my dog to be able to "overlook" a lot of stuff so the activity truly is fun for both of us.
We are in our sixth month (4th session) of foundation classes in agility, and the highest we jump at this point is 8" - with most of the work being started with the poles on the ground. We are just now starting to put a jump or two together with a tunnel, rear crosses over jumps set on a turn, and have yet to see the dog walk, weave poles or the a-frame. We do lots of very controlled teeter work (targeting 2o/2o, highly rewarded bounce the teeter games, having the dogs stand on the elevated teeter while we just feed, feed, feed them, etc.). There are many exercises that can be done without any equipment at all (teaching left/right, rear cross, sit/down on a mark, targeting, etc.).
It's really been good for Chili, her competition obedience has improved because of it, too....and I'm in NO hurry to go forward too fast. About half our class are puppies. Knowing what I know now, I would have started her very young, as a foundation class is much different that the more advanced classes where the dogs are doing courses and the whoops and hollers can be heard for 1/4 mile, LOL.