George Manning – Dog Behaviorist

With the arrival of summer comes the opportunity to try something new with your dog. Dog sports are a great way to fulfil your dog’s innate abilities as well as releasing their energy and making them calmer and more fulfilled. A good starting point to find out what will drive your dog the most is their breed. If your dog represents the typical standards and traits of the breed, then finding a suitable sport will be easy. Retrievers love to retrieve, water breeds such as Nova Scotias love to be in water, Huskies love mushing, and so on. If your dog is not so representative of the breed, then finding out what drives them is up to you.  Every dog has something that really drives them. Dogs’ enjoyment of sports comes solely from their instinct to hunt, but diverges off many different ways from here.

Some of the most popular dog sports include;

• Agility

• Backpacking

• Biking/Bikejoring

• Cani cross

• Carting

• Dock Jumping

• Flyball

• Herding

• Mushing

• Obedience

• Retrieving

• Swimming

• Tracking

The sports involve;

Agility

Agility – probably the most popular dog sport, agility involves the handler directing their dog through various obstacles on an obstacle course. Obstacles can include dog walks, jumps, weave poles, see-saws and tunnels, among other things. Directions are given through voice and body language, but require the dog’s initiative for the most part. Competition generally involves dividing dogs into sizes and ruling the winner based predominantly on how quickly they complete the course. Competing can certainly make the handler more vigilant, more intense and quicker to respond, all of which will result in more fun on both the human and dog’s part, so why not.
For more info or to find a club near you, contact the United States Dog Agility Association http://www.usdaa.com/ the North American Dog Agility Council http://www.nadac.com/ or the American Kennel Club http://www.akc.org/ If you live in the UK there is a list of clubs by region here http://agilitynet.co.uk/activepages/clubs.asp

Backpacking – quite simply this involves strapping a dog backpack to your dog for a hike. The dog can carry water, toys, food, dog bowls and other useful things. US – http://wolfpacks.com/ UK – http://www.4activedogs.co.uk/

Bikejoring

Biking – this involves riding a bike with the dog on lead next to, or preferably attached via a bike-dog attachment. This allows dogs that prefer to run to really let loose and have fun. Most dogs’ natural pace is a jogging or running speed, so a bike allows us relatively slow and frail mammals called humans, to keep up with the rugged, quick and tough mammal, our companion dogs. More info here http://www.springer-uk.com/ Bikejoring is the sport form of this.

Cani Cross – simple but fun sport that involves attaching a long lead to the waist of the handler that is attached to a harness around the dog or dogs, which allows the dog to pull the handler whilst running. Originally with the purpose of off-season training for mushing and sledding dogs, it is now an emerging sport of its own right, and becoming increasingly popular. It is great exercise for both human and dog, as well as giving the dog the job of pulling the handler for a lot of the run. It suits natural pulling / sled type dogs best, but is open to dogs of all breeds, shapes and sizes. Many dogs enjoy pulling regardless of their breed. More info here http://www.canicross.org.uk/ and here http://www.cani-cross.co.uk/ Not so popular in the US, here is one club in Minnesota http://www.points-unknown.com/canicross_hiking_club.htm

Carting – this is an activity that involves the dog pulling a dog cart containing supplies, or sometimes a human (see Mushing). This best suits large and strong dogs, such as mastiff, bull and sled type dogs. Carts can be found here http://dogworks.com/ but generally any cart will do, just ensure it is safe and comfortably attached to the dog.

Dock Jumping

Dock Jumping – a sport that is recently becoming popular this summer that involves the dog jumping for distance or height, from a dock, into water. It offers not only a way for dogs to cool off in the heat, but to have great fun too in jumping at speed from a platform. Often a toy is used to motivate the dog to jump, known as the “chase object” but is not required to retrieve or get the toy. This is the ideal summer sport so get out there and have a go, more info here http://www.dockdogs.com/

Flyball – This is a fast paced sport involving teams of dogs racing against each other, over hurdles, to a box that releases a ball to pick up and return, back over the hurdles, to the handler. This is best suited to quick, agile dogs, but is not necessarily restricted to certain breeds. British Flyball Association http://www.flyball.org.uk/North American Flyball Association http://www.flyball.org/

Herding

Herding – this involves using a dog to move a group of animals, usually sheep or goat, from one place to another. This is best suited to (of course) herding breeds which range from Collies to Rottweilers and German Shepherds. Often people have a working collie as a pet, only to watch them destroy their home, shake nonstop and fixate on just about everything; this occurs simply because working collies were born to herd day in day out, so don’t deprive them of this. There are many herding type breeds and a lot of dogs enjoy it anyway. Herding breeds such as Border Collies were selectively bred to perform only 3 parts of the hunt, sight, stalk and chase, without the kill. Replacing the kill part of the hunt is a little nip on the legs or feet of the animal, which is often not even necessary or required. The best way to find out where you can take your dog to herd, is to contact the breed club or association for your breed, for example the Border Collie Club of the UK.

Dog-Sledding

Mushing – mushing is a term used to describe any mode of ‘dog-powered’ transport. It always involves attaching the dog via harness to a piece of equipment that the handler stands or sits on, the dog pulls this equipment whilst the handler assists in directing the dog or dogs. This is arguably more efficient and fun than Canicross, as the dog exerts less effort and higher speeds are reached. It can be in the form of bikejoring, skijoring, dog-sledding, pulka, scootering, freighting and weight pulling. Learn more http://sleddog.org http://www.webheads.co.uk/sleddog/

Obedience – this involves directing the dog to do specific acts often to a standard, for example “sit” “stay” “stop” “heel” “jump” etc. Obedience classes are common in the United States, and dotted around the UK as well. The American Kennel Club and Kennel Club offer certifications for levels of obedience. Do not get confused however, obedience is separate to dog behavior and behavioral issues. Obedience involves teaching dogs to understand human commands and acts, whereas dog behavior and addressing dog behavior issues involves understanding THEM, and helping them to return to their natural state of mental balance. Obedience is enjoyable for both human and dog as it involves a lot of mental stimulation and challenge, as well as being impressive to watch and show. AKC obedience – http://www.akc.org/events/obedience/index.cfm KC obedience – http://www.thekennelclub.org.uk/obedience

Retrieving – a simple activity that involves placing or releasing an object a distance from the handler for a dog to collect and return to the handler. Most dogs can enjoy this, but is best suited to retriever breeds such as the Labrador Retriever and Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retrieving, among many other breeds, these breeds were also bred to retrieve from water and is another great activity.

Swimming – any dog can learn to swim. In summer time swimming really is something all dog owners must try. Whether it be in a paddle pool, a pond, or a swimming pool, dogs love it. Similar to humans, it challenges a lot of muscles in their body, as well as mentally stimulating them to keep afloat and move fast. Many dogs naturally love to jump into water aswell. All dogs naturally enjoy water, it is an important innate trait, but some dogs either aren’t exposed to it or create a negative association, so need a dedicated handler to help them learn to love water. It doens’t matter if you don’t own a pool, head down to the local lake or pond, your dog will love the cool off along with the stimulation.

Tracking – tracking is the one sport that encourages above the others, the most powerful and important part of the dog, the nose. Dogs prioritize the world as smells before sights, so tracking really does help utilize this natural ability. Dogs use their noses all the time, just watch your dogs nose and you will realise just how much they use it. Tracking involves simply finding an object or person using the dogs nose, often following a scent trail. You can lay scent tracks with the object of the scent at the end of the track, to give the dog a bit of assistance and enjoyment in following a specific scent path. Tracking trials are the official form of tracking, but really anyone can do it. Tracking is divided into air and ground scenting, with the meanings in the name, dogs use both during tracking. ALL dogs should be exposed to this activity, it is not breed specific but some breeds such as Bloodhounds may be much more suited to tracking at a very high level.

Dog Surfing

Surfing – this involves surfing either with a dog with the handler on the board, or with the dog alone on the board. Dogs naturally like to try and stay on platforms afloat in water, so can adjust quickly to surfing alone. Some associations offer a dog surf-a-thon in the USA, for the more extravagent dog-sport enthusiasts. Nonetheless, anyone can try putting their dog on a board or lilo in water, as long as they like water, they will enjoy staying afloat.

There are literally hundreds of sports, these are just a few of the most popular. This summer offers so many opportunities to try out new things with your dog(s), everyone should take advantage.

Get out there and have fun,

- George