Sunday, March 25, 2007

It's called flyBALL for a reason....







Cash and I attended flyball class this afternoon. There are only 3 (sometimes 4) dog/handler teams in our beginner class. Cash's appearance in this class came at the second lesson after our other toy poodle, Keegan, (that's him over there on the right) was rediagnosed with collapsing trachea and a heart murmur on the left side. Keegan had been to one class and showed promise as a flyball dog (he LOVES tennis balls) but after getting his latest health report I decided to retire him to the position of couch potato. He will be 9 years old on April 29th. He still beats the crap out of Cash in play whenever he feels like it (generally at least once a day) but I didn't want to stress him with the high intensity of flyball and send him to an early grave. Enter Cash who couldn't care less about tennis balls but has a ton of intensity, speed and focus. His flipturns on the box are to die for, but what good is a flyball dog if he won't grab the ball?? However he did a perfect 2o2o on the box this afternoon which got a laugh from Lyndsy, one of the instuctors who had been in a previous agility class with us. I don't know how long this flyball foray will continue, but we'll see if he gets the hang of it and enjoys it, we may take another class.

2 comments:

Avalon said...

Julie~~ That's my next venture....at some point. Since Trevor is so ball-obsessed, I would like to eventually give flyball a try.I just think he'll have a real problem returning the ball!

Julie said...

Go for it! I've learned that most dogs can distinguish between the different events. Although Cash likes to mix and match (witness the 2o2o on the flyball box). Little nutcase! It's really a shame that Keegan couldn't continue because he IS ball obsesssed, but I wasn't willing to take the risk.