Does anybody know what age a dog should be before they can start agility classes??Our Bc x lab is now 6mths old,we also have a local scampers. I would love to get into agility ,i heard they need to be a year old as it can damage there joints ,is this true??? Thankyou in advance for any replys.

I think it is 12 months to go on all kinds of obstacles, but you can start puppies off on things such as the tunnel & walk where they don't have to jump. You shouldn't let a young pup jump too much as you can cause damage - bigger the dog, worse the damage. You need to make sure your puppy is good at basic obedience tho'. He'll get so much more out of it off the lead.

i do agility and i did what they call all the flats to start with this is the a frame dog walk and tunnels the a frame and dog walk to get the contacts,and with regard to jumping `12 months is a good age, but to learn my puppy he had a back end we lay poles on the floor and he learnt to just trot over them, but you do also need basic obedience and this starts asap.
carol.

It is very important not to start before at least 12 months, especially with a large dog like a Lab. The weave poles can do the most damage at an early age. Use the next 6 months to get the basic obedience right, you will benefit so much from this when you start training for agility.

Sandra

I do agility and have great fun, you can practise the tunnel and dog walk , dog must be on lead, and try to keep to the same command for each obstacle, all 3 of my Gsds were over a year old before I did any jumping or weaves, its a great way to meet people, and i love to watch all the dogs.best of luck and remember agility is fun.

Hello,
For a breed like yours, they have to be at least 12 months. However you can put in the ground work now which will really benefit you and your dog later.
When my BC was 6 months old, I started teaching her left and right, I'd encourage her round in a right hand circle and then turn my hand left, so she'd turn left, and at the same time say "back". I also did this the other way using "close". We also did a lot of sendaways and recalls over poles on the floor (with jump wings too, so she learnt to go through the wings) starting with 2 jumps and increased it to 6. We didn't introduce any contact equipment, apart from letting her watch the seesaw bang down, so it didn't frighten her when she was older. You can also teach them to let you "cross-behind" them, without them panicking about where you are going.
Those are just some of the things you can teach a dog as young as yours, without damaging their joints. My youngest BC, now 18.5 months had her first show with my younger sis, who's 11, last saturday. She had 2nd fastest time in helter skelter put had a pole down, and 4th in elementary jumping. So I was chuffed to pieces! We have had quite a few problems with her partly because she's extremely sensitive, but her knowing left and rights meant that she picked up sequences of jumps quicker, and this helped her confidence to grow. Teaching her what I've mentioned above also stopped the urge of wanting to increase jump height, start on contacts and weaves before she was old enough, as there was loads of things you could do to teach them left and rights over poles.
H2H
Char123

I would also put her on a table or wall to groom her to get her used to being off the ground - some dogs ( have one) are scared of heights :(

Christine