Flyball question

Fly ball requires hyper vigilance on the part of owners and CONSIDERABLE dedication to conditioning warm ups and cool downs to prevent injuries.  I know of a fair number of dogs who's competitive career in any dog sport was cut short due to shoulder injuries in fly ball.

 FLyballers tend to wrap if their dogs are prone to burning pads or tearing dewclaws.  Some do it just as a preventative measure - the tourney where you are only bringing four dogs on a particular team, is not when you want to find out that your dog has tender pads!

Training emphasizes safety - well, it usually does.  I don't force my dogs over elaborate training devices if they tend to be non-thinkers at the box.  Zhi has no problem, but Cord is a bulldozer and a menace to himself.  Instead of "patterning" type shaping, I carefully backchain with him - because once the B-A-L-L is in play, all rational thought leaves the building.

Anyway, the main way to avoid injury is to shape a correct "box turn" - where your dogs take a U-Turn on the box instead of "hitting" it.   In the past, many dogs slammed the box and it led to too many short careers. 

The other thing that is often neglected, is careful training of passes.  Dogs that learn body awareness while in full flight, no matter what dog is approaching them and where they are doing it, face fewer injuries related to collisions and accident avoidance.  Ideally you'll learn to pass over a jump - first double width and spaced passes, then narrowing the jump and the timing until the dogs are jumping together (one way one the other), over a normal width jump. 

Good luck and have fun! 

after watching dog after dog smash into the box and leave blood all over the mats from torn pads I'm never going to put a dog into flyball. I'm sure the dogs enjoy it and all but it looks more dangerous than herding cattle.

I'd never run a box-smasher and if a dog is bleeding on the mats, the rules say that dog is out.  My dogs also tear pads just playing with each other during hot dry weather (BCs, sheesh ) but I'm not going to prevent them from doing that! 

it looks more dangerous than herding cattle.

It may look it, but you'll have to trust me when I say herding anything is far more dangerous.  But cattle especially.  I've never heard of a dog dying from a flyball-related injury (not that it couldn't have happened, I just haven't heard of a case myself).  But of the last five cattle dog National Champions, two are dead from work accidents. 

One tries to be safe but moving livestock around just isn't a safe activity in general.  Just this morning a lamb that weighed a mere sixty pounds took a notion that my kneecap was a great target.  I'm okay, luckily it's the one that was reconstructed after my wreck - but if it had been the other one I've no doubt I'd be in the hospital.  Ben's been knocked out completely stone cold working sheep, twice.  I had a friend whose dog went into the woods after some sheep and came out with a stick rammed nine inches into her.  Along her flank rather than straight in, thankfully, but it had to be surgically removed and the dog never worked sheep again.  Just last week Ted and I had to work sheep in dense woods and you bet I was thinking of that accident the whole time.

In flyball it's a controlled situation, in spite of the intensity of the activity.  There are eyeballs peeled all the time for things going amiss, and lots of rules in place to promote safety.  I have yet to see a box or ball ram a handler or dog, or a dog impale itself on a piece of equipment, and in fact it's human injuries I think of most in that sport!  By the end of the weekend everyone's complaining of joint pain from catching dogs and stooping, exhaustion from repeated runs up and down the lane, various bruises from falling or tripping or crashing into another handler.  And the dogs are not more than "happy tired," merely ready to relax the next day, while it takes the humans a week to recover! 

mudpuppy

after watching dog after dog smash into the box and leave blood all over the mats from torn pads I'm never going to put a dog into flyball.

Wow, what horrid flyball have you experienced? I have neven seen such a thing. Such a thing would never be tolerated here, and it is certainly not something I have ever witnessed, and I have attended my share of NAFA flyball tournaments (and line judged my first one two weekends ago, and am booked for the next one in July). I am hoping to get my girls into flyball soon (they have some things to work on first), and can't wait, and am waiting to hear back about officially joining a local flyball club here.  I know many people who run many dogs of many sizes, from JRT's to Chi mixes to Border Collies and Staffy mixes, to Mini Schnauzers, and I haven't yet witnessed and injury at a tournament, and certainly never any blood!

 As for danger, are there risks? Certainly.  But careful training can eliminate a heck of a lot of it, and do much to lessen the risk much more. Things like Swimmer's turns take careful teaching, and are done to prevent the hard impact of of the box. Also, using the appropriate box type with the right amount of spring is essential. Not all flyball boxes are created equally. But like anything else, agility can be extremely dangerous if things are not taught precisely and properly. Even teaching a simple jump can be dangerous if not done properly. But like any high-intensity sport, of course there will be some risk. And you'll notice that all competing dogs have a few things in common - very good musculature, very athletic, and are very fit. You don't just take any old dog and throw them into a flyball race. It takes much conditioning, training, and exercise to get a great flyball dog that is at its lowest risk for injury.