At what age can I begin training (for fun) with Spice on agility? We have placed some canes in the garden (quite far apart) for weaving and hubby has already got her weaving in and out of his legs for about 4 paces using a bit of cheese as enticement.But when can we start small jumps or  'tunnelling' with her.She is now 7 months and we are fast running out of things to teach her to do,that will not hurt her back or legs in anyway.We do restrict stairs she never attempts them unless we are with her and make her go up and down any steps with great caution,plus we have a stairgate on the stairs at home!!

Someone else told me their border collie started agility at a training centre,somewhere in the N.E. at around 8months, but I thought that was too young?

Any advice welcome.We may or may not progress to agility comps.or flyball,but it looks such good fun I think Spice would absolutely love it! Keeping her from bounding about all over the place on walks,up hill and down dale as it were,in one rabbit hole or another is bad enough! she has so much energy and the five minute per month of age exercise rule, has never been possible to keep to.If I could go on for more than an hour each walk I'm sure she would too,but since losing our previous dog it is taking me sometime to get my muscles and legs back into walking mode :D it's more of a shuffle at the moment :D

Jacqueline.

You shouldn't really do weaving yet or A frame or jumping.  Tunnels or the dog walk plank on the floor I do with pups.  You could also place a ladder on the ground and get her walking, trotting and then running through it to make her aware of her feet.  You can do the occasional very low jump and use that to teach her to wait in front of it.  I teach mine a rock steady wait by calling them over the jump about 1 in 10 jumps and throwing the ball behind them with an okay the other 9 times.  Teach left and right commands by running with her and throwing toy or treat left or right.  Get her used to running on both sides of you and crossing over.  Turning quickly with you on command with toy or treat.  Teach a 'go on' command.  Running towards treat on upturned bucket after a low jump or tunnel.  The equipment is a doddle.  It's the control, or lack of that lets people down when they start to do agility.

you could start with basic obedience as it is needed in agility, also putting the pole about 4 inch off the ground so they just step over it and when they do use your command that you are going to use for her to jump, at our club we teach pups the contact points you know the coloured bits at the ends of the dog walk and A frame  and seesaw etc,
for the A frame we have it flat on the floor and the dogs just walk over it and wait at the end , we do the same with the dog walk , then as they get more confident and are shooting along it on the floor and waiting at the end we then get out the baby A frame it is  less than four foot when fully assembled and we see how the dogs react to that, it is also not as fully upright as the large A frame , if the dogs hesitate or really back off it goes back onto the floor until confidence is gained again. our dog walk is about 3 foot off the ground and the dogs usually belt over that thinking that it is still the same as on the ground, and then some will realise they are up in the air and some will freeze, but this is lower enough for you to be beside your dog and to talk to it and gain its confidence, this is the way i was taught with my collie and he is learning very fast, our chinese crested is 6 months old and she is learning contacts and what the word wait means, and she has grown in confidence with each lesson.
I would also say don't rush, if your club teaches you and expects you to be all on the same level, to me that is not fair diferent dogs progress at different paces, my collie was on full height on all the obstacles except full height jumps as trainer said he was to young being 13 months to take full height yet, but we had to go back to the baby A frame and dog walk as i did not know he had an ear infection and he fell off the full height dog walk ,and really winded himself, so the next week when we went to club he would not go near the dog walk or seesaw, so the trainer got the baby gear out and we relearnt everything again.
you also mentioned the weaves our training weaves at club are the ones that are bent into the V shape and the dogs are just run through the middle, and they are left in the V shape for a long time and slowly are put upright but i noticed only when our trainer thinks the dogs are old enough.Hope some of the things i have said have been of help to you, but lots of trainers have different methods.
Carol

Thanks for your replies!
We have been trying with left and right for a month or so now and are progressing slowly.I like the idea of a ladder on the ground,we will try that one next! Also the contact point/coloured ends will be quite a challenge so lots to get on with now :D

Jacqueline.